


Things You Find In A Graveyard

by SunlitGarden



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Repo! The Genetic Opera Fusion, Betty Cooper Needs a Hug, Corpse Harvesting, Dark, F/M, Grave Robbers, Graveyard Life, Hal Has Issues, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Minor Character Death, Painkillers, References to Illness, Sardonic Humor is Jug's Way of Relating to the World, Strangers to Lovers, Zydrate (Repo!)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:16:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26895823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunlitGarden/pseuds/SunlitGarden
Summary: Sometimes Betty holds her breath just so she can imagine what it’s like to be dead. It’s a morbid game she’s played since she was a kid, wondering if it would bring her closer to her mother—to anyone—since she got sick.An unexpected connection with graverobber Jughead sparks Betty's desire to push for a vibrant life beyond the mausoleum prison her Night Surgeon father keeps her in to keep her "safe." But breaking free of her "treatment" means throwing herself at the mercy of her disease--and possibly, the sadistic Blossoms, who monopolize the medical and cosmetic surgery fields and are hunting Jughead for illegally obtaining and dealing painkillers. They insist her blood disease isn't what she thinks. With love, life, and livelihood empires on the line, Betty will have to dig up the dirt on her past and all its players before she ends up back in the graveyard.A Repo! The Genetic Opera AU / inspired Alternate Universe
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Comments: 141
Kudos: 79
Collections: 8th Bughead Fanfiction Awards - Nominees





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I could spoil everything from the movie and how it'll play into the story but just private message me on tumblr @lovedinapastlife if you're worried about squishy feelings. Totally understandable. I started writing this fic over a year ago, but my beta got sick and I got depressed so it was shelved. But it feels like now or never is the time to post it, yeah? So we're gonna post maybe a chapter a week until it's over.

Sometimes Betty holds her breath just so she can imagine what it’s like to be dead. It’s a morbid game she’s played since she was a kid, wondering if it would bring her closer to her mother—to anyone—since she got sick.

Her father opens the door with a groan. She’s laying in bed in her skirt, shirt, thigh-high socks, and shoes, tucked in and hidden under the covers. The ritual inspection means life-like stillness is mandatory. Blocking the door with his body, Hal lifts the bottles by her bedside and counts the pills amidst the agonizing rattle of each tablet pushing from one side to another. No touching. No warnings. No kiss to the forehead like when she’s awake. Just observing, like it’s almost time to take her blood and go over lessons from homeschooling.

Whatever appointments or emergencies he needs to tend to have been keeping him later and later. He claims it’s because the world is sick. They need doctors, like him. Surgeons.

When all the locks shudder into place, Betty’s brain ignites. With nimble fingers and all the flourish of a quickly drawn saber, she unsheathes bobby pins and gets to work. Her skills with the small, make-shift lock picks have improved over the years. Nancy Drew may have inspired her earliest attempts at subterfuge, but independent studies have helped her become proficient.

A library card, the singular freedom allowed by her father, is her means of all forms of education and escape. He’d probably revoke it if he bothered to look up the borrowed titles. _The Count of Monte Cristo_ with the hero digging a tunnel and fleeing the prison island in a body bag. _Flowers in the Attic_ with its failed soap keys and windowless rooms. _The Collector_ with its unhappy ending.

 _The_ _Collector_ …

Betty had stopped gathering bugs after that one. It felt _wrong_ , somehow. Harvesting their carcasses to pin behind glass or keep them to crawl in cages seemed callous.

Still, she admires them and their resilience. Apparently, in some parts of the world, there are real butterflies that flit from flower to flower and reside in the colorful petals. City bugs are darker and more hardy. At least that makes them a lot easier to draw with her black ink pens.

Betty slips between the cracks and not-so secret passages of the house that her father probably thinks she’s too sickly or naive to traverse. The dirt tunnels are unfinished and dusty with an acidic, almost bleach smell that used to make her want to retch. Now, she’s prepared for it, and straps a breathing mask on when she goes past his lab towards the graveyard entrance.

Ivy’s grown thick on the inside of the mausoleum walls, inching up to her mother’s and sister’s portraits. All she has left of them are a few hazy memories: her mother’s dark eyeliner that winged at the corners, the press of a plastic orange pill cylinder into her hands. “ _Focus_ ,” she’d urge with startling intensity. Polly had an eerie calmness and flaxen blonde hair. A quiet hum haunts Betty during thunderstorms and she can sense a figure in the dark by her bedside. Betty had never seen them smile without a tilt of their chins, picture perfect, like in their final portraits.

It’s _something,_ at least.

Too bad the Smith family genetics are such a bitch.

A _literal_ blood disease.

At least, that’s how it seemed to manifest.

Polly was throwing up off and on for a few weeks before she succumbed. One day, she wasn’t in her room anymore and Betty had the bathroom to herself. Their mom’s death was more of a secret, but Betty remembered her blue veins had throbbed green, spreading at the tips, and there wasn’t any surgery to save her.

 _You can’t change your blood_.

At least Mom’s treatment helped Dad figure out how to pace things a little better for the next time someone was stricken with symptoms. It happened every day.

Some people survived. Some didn’t. And Betty’s been infected.

No chasing dreams or flies or friends.

Dad says he’s protecting her. That he won’t lose the last of his girls as long as he draws breath.

As Betty pulls off her breathing mask, she tugs at the black bob wig to keep it in place. Sweat soaks her fingers the moment she dips them under her cap to readjust the bobby pins. Not wanting to stain the blank pages, she wipes her hand on her skin and then on her dress. There’s something icky about the idea of _literally_ putting her blood, sweat, and tears on a page.

On her television appearances, Blind Hermione tells people that creating art can be healing. The celebrity had gone beyond songwriting and soared towards the high-tech eyes that cured her blindness and could project and record parts of her concerts. Of course, that was before the Blossoms, the owners of GeneCo, came on and said, “When art doesn’t _cut_ it, invest in organs from GeneCo.” Betty might as well _try_ writing, since none of her pills seem to be doing anything.

As if summoned by her thoughts, someone in the graveyard starts humming one of Hermione’s songs.

Her grip instinctively tightens on her pen.

Betty’s interacted with people. When she was little, she thinks. She _remembers_ :

_Fists pounding on the second of the iron gate sets, junkies screaming about monsters._

“ _Do you see this, Betty? Do you hear them? Don’t let them in. They’re sick.”_

_“Well, I’m sick, too, Dad.”_

_Eyes lined with pain, her father shook his head. “You’ll get better.”_

_Better._

Digging her pen into the page, Betty watches the ink bleed.

A chirping flutter snaps her out of her rage. A bug with black wings creeps into the crypt, and she’s transfixed by the slightest hint of orange coloring its small body. Without warning, it spreads its wings and _glows_.

Her whole heart takes flight along with this bug. She’s robbed of air. Of sickness. The discovery shocks every melancholic thought out of her head. Scraping her knees, Betty scrambles after the bug to find where it came from. Is there a nest? What does it eat? How does it _glow_? Dissecting it won’t help, but if she _draws_ it…

She closes her hands around it in a dome, scooping it closer. No pincers, so it shouldn’t bite.

It seems content to be caught between the spacious gap in her hands and crawls on her crescent-scarred skin with its wispy little legs. Two antennae wiggle at her with vague interest before the bug flexes its wings and hops away.

“No, wait!”

The bug doesn’t heed her gestures and slips through the cracks in the door.

 _Outside_.

Betty’s muscles tense. Bad blood. Bad air. Bad _people_ are out there.

 _They’re in here, too_.

Snatching her bag, Betty unlocks the door and steps out into the world in search of her tiny, miraculous specimen.

She’ll be quick.

Fresh air hits her with all the glory of mulch. She swallows hard and creeps through the graveyard, stepping off the cobblestone path and into the grass, something she hasn’t felt, let alone _seen_ in what’s probably months. Every place she looks seems to be cast in a blue hue—more because of the giant GeneCo video billboard ads in the inner city than the moon. The signs are staked into multiple graves: “ _Graverobbers will be shot on sight._ ”

She’s not robbing anybody. Or anything. She just wants a picture—the bug’s story. Still, if the authorities think she’s stealing because she’s creeping around… she better keep out of sight before they pull the trigger.

A tiny beacon flashes in the night.

Awkwardly ambling in her black ankle boots (the white ones show stains too easily), Betty follows the light, closing in on the source of tumbling dirt and humming.

Someone’s digging a grave.

A man, by the timbre of the hum.

Tongue pressed to her lips, Betty squats behind a tombstone and eyes the bug, who seems content to sit still and play with its antennae for a minute. Moving as quickly as she can, she opens to a random page in her journal and flings her pen across the page. It’s a rough sketch, barely legible, so she takes her time with the next, really honing in on the details.

Dirt cascades in a steady rhythm under the man’s hums and Betty can’t help but let her eyes wander from the bug to the tool kit laying nearby on the ground. Syringe guns. Chisels.

Maybe he’s a doctor, like her dad.

Or he could be someone who prepares the dead bodies–a mortician. From what she understands, people don’t really have _funerals_ anymore and her dad doesn’t dig the graves—does he? Their home’s location would certainly be convenient for that.

As her mind wanders, her pen stills, and Betty freezes when she realizes the digger no longer has his back turned. He’s walking towards her. Belt buckles jangle and she tenses, each step shooting adrenaline straight to her brain. She curls into herself and presses against the cool stone to try and blend into shadows.

A hand appears, pale and covered in sharp, intricate, metal rings, nails painted black. Combat boots. Jeans. The loops hanging off of them must be suspenders, although she’s never really _seen_ suspenders except in old movies. His dusty leather jacket reminds her of James Dean, but the _beanie_ seems out of place, a strange statement piece over wavy back hair that looks like it was cut by a blunt switchblade and without a mirror. She’d done something similar once when she was bored and wanted to try something.

As he leans down, the light catches the metal on his rings, his shoes, the metal pin on his hat. He pauses, his chin tilting slightly towards her in the dark as if he can sense her.

Heartbeat in her throat, Betty inhales and clutches her pen tightly in one fist, ready to stab. To pin. Just like a beetle to a board.

The man’s eyes flick over her, lingering on the journal in her hands. “Nice pic,” he says, lips quirking in a smirk before he grabs a syringe and goes back to the grave.

_That’s it?_

Still shaking with adrenaline, Betty peers around the gravestone. The digger hauls a corpse out. It’s so old that he doesn’t even have to use the kerchief around his neck to cover his nose and mouth from the stench. Eyes wide, she regards the carcass, the way the man moves it with so little effort or care.

He’s not supposed to touch that.

But Digger doesn’t seem to care if it’s hygienic or sacrilegious. He pulls something off the syringe with his teeth and then stabs it into the skull. She flinches at the crunch, prepared to never open her eyes again, but then...a glow.

It’s different than the bug’s.

A blue fluid radiates like neon in the vial. He keeps pulling until the syringe is full and disconnects it for inspection.

_Does he need a nightlight?_

Digger chuckles, glancing at her over his shoulder. “It’s the 21st century cure.”

Realizing she must’ve spoken aloud, Betty shifts back down behind the tombstone.

“It’s alright, kid. I’m not going to hurt you.”

He doesn’t look much older than her. Annoyed, she glares at him over the tombstone. Digger stuffs the vial into his coat, then retrieves an empty one to stick on the syringe. “Long as you don’t try and rob me, we’ll be just fine,” he says, locking it in.

“Aren’t you the one robbing? Corpses, that is?”

“The dead don’t need their Zydrate, anymore, do they? No pain when you're dead, so they say.” She writes the words “ _zydrate?”_ and “ _pain_ ” down in her journal and creeps around the tombstone.

“What are you going to do with it?”

Digger sighs, weary, and hauls another body out of the grave with a grunt. “We’ve all got bills to pay.” These people aren’t buried one by one. No caskets, urns, or portraits for remembrance like in the mausoleum. In the dark, she’s not even sure there are names etched on the grave so much as dates. Does no one else visit the dead?

“I keep them company once in a while.” Digger shoots her an odd look and kneels while Betty makes an effort not to vocalize her more pressing reactions like she does at the spotty television in her room when she’s alone. Well, she’s almost always alone. Digger jabs a needle in the corpse’s brain until blue light gushes up into the glass. Vibrant and wrong, she stares at it, her knees wobbling in the effort to stay hidden.

She needs to go back.

Part of her wants to know what the other tools are for, what this process _is_. She wants a tiny flicker of this to keep. The bug. The blue light.

This vial fills up more quickly than the other one.

“How much of that is in everyone?”

His eyes don’t leave the syringe as he pulls it out and replaces the vial, efficient and casual, like he’s changing a light bulb. “Depends how many surgeries they’ve had.”

“I haven’t had any.” Pills, yes. Medicine too. But the organ failure that seemed to hit the rest of the world hasn’t crashed into her yet. Maybe that’s one benefit of having bad blood—things don’t work the same.

Digger drops the dead body with a thud, a bewildered expression on his face. “What do you mean you _haven’t had any_?”

She’s said something wrong. The rattle of iron gates plays in her head.

Heart pounding, she backs up, one hand splayed on the meaningless stone. “I don’t know. I haven’t had any.”

“You’re a surgeon virgin?”

 _Virgin surgeon?_ She’s read the term somewhere—someone who hunts and seduces inexperienced girls for sport. Or maybe he’s implying something about that syringe gun and the tools in his pack.

“Where are you from, Lightning?” He stalks closer with a swagger she’s not used to.

“I don’t...” She glances over her shoulder at the mausoleum door. If she can just get inside, she’ll be back in her house with the giant locks. Safe. Alone. Away from creeps who steal blue brain juice from corpses. “I have to go.”

Just as she starts to stand, a harsh, pale blue beam sweeps the graveyard. It paints across her skin so quickly that she wonders if it’s a glimmer of a hallucination.

“ _Run_!”

She doesn’t know what’s happening, just that Digger is lunging for his tools as an alarm blares through cone-shaped attachments at the top of the dingy streetlights.

Men in hazmat suits with scoped guns swarm, leaping over iron gates and tombstones. “Shoot the trespassers!”

“I’m just visiting!” she protests.

“Yeah right,” one of the men says, hauling his gun up to his shoulder to aim. A microphone speaker of some kind amplifies their voices loud enough to make her heart hammer in her chest. She’s not even able to raise a hand before the mausoleum door slams shut and locks, iron bars coming down like teeth. Panic swallows her whole.

“Psst, Bug.”

She whips her head in the direction of the voice. One black-painted finger gestures from a secret maw of a nearby building.

Without knowing what else to do, she follows him through the stone slat and collapses into the bumpy, horrendous-smelling room.

Screams die in her throat.

 _Bodies_. Dead bodies. _Everywhere_.

“Jackpot.”

Everything’s blurring too much for Betty to register what’s happening beyond the footsteps of the guards outside and the blaring alarms. Breathing hurts and her head is spinning—she can’t even tell if it’s because of her stupid disease or if it’s something to do with adrenaline. Gut twisting, she backs up against another pile of bodies, desperately falling over limbs until she gets to the wall. There has to be another slat. She doesn’t want to be dead. Her first time outside and this is it? A few glowing lights and a murder pit?

“Breathe. The dead aren’t going to do anything to you, but if you don’t quiet down, those guards might.”

“I’m not even saying anything!”

The low beams of rifles sweep and single her out. Digger dips into the shadows as arms shoot out from an unseen slat and drag her back to the graveyard.

“Wait! Please,” she begs, tears slicking down her face. If she doesn’t fight them, maybe they won’t hurt her. Maybe they’ll listen. “I’m sick. I’m not robbing anyone. I just need my medicine.”

They raise their rifles in tandem.

_This is it._

The end of her miserable life. All because she yearned for something shiny.

_Dad was right._

It’s the last, agonizing thought she has before a man in an armored version of their suit shoves his way to the front, knocking aside their rifles to do the deed himself.

“Dad,” she sobs, the blue neon light flickering inside his suit blurring with her tears. For a second, it looks like _him_. All her thoughts come untethered as blackness eats away her vision. She falls forward in a tremor. It’s not so far to her end, now. She claws at the cold, hard dirt for one last feel, one last attempt to connect with the earth, with a worm, with _anything_ , until the rifle’s lights fade into her little flickering bug, crawling and nesting with her in this makeshift grave.

#

Reality violently yanks her out of the dark. Betty touches her sweaty scalp, free of its wig, her heart pounding hard. Her skirt and top have been replaced by a white babydoll dress that makes her look like a child. Dad must’ve picked it out.

Shuddering, she rubs her arms, her fingers brushing a needle jabbed into her skin.

A shrill beeping emits from the machine at her side and the lower level of the house. Scowling, she rips the heart monitor from her arm.

Hal emerges within moments, his footsteps solid and sure. “Betty?”

“What?” She knows she shouldn’t be snippy with him–shouldn’t _test_ him after everything, but her head’s pounding, she feels like vomiting, and he’s probably pissed at her anyways.

“How did you get out?”

The question burrows under her skin like a vengeful, blind mole.

“I thought we were only worried about people getting in.” The gray passivity of his supposedly green eyes and firm set of his jaw give nothing away. Taking a gamble, Betty glances out the window. “You forgot to lock up before you left.” He flinches, but doesn’t disagree. “I just wanted to go outside for a second. There was this bug–”

Hal exhales through his nose and fixes her with a steady gaze. “I’ve told you, it isn’t safe outside.”

“What about fresh air? I’ve read that exercise and socialization can help–”

“Help what? Help you get killed faster? What would you have done if I–?” He huffs, crossing his arms and prowling across the room. “They won’t find you, Polly. I’ll make sure of it.”

It always unnerves her when he calls her _Alice,_ too. It’s part of the reason she experiments with her wigs. The dark hair should make it easier to identify who she is—that she’s _different_. “I’m _Betty_ ,” she reminds him.

His jaw clicks, almost moving of its own accord as he continues ranting. “I’ll protect you from the leeches. The _scum_. Those _thorny blossoms_ won’t corrupt my daughter,” he growls, his voice a whole octave lower than normal.

 _Thorny blossoms,_ she wonders, taking note with a neat script in her head.

Hal seems to come back into himself, wiping the dribble of spit from his lips. “Anyway, I think it’s time for you to take your medicine and get some rest. You’ve had too much excitement today.”

“I just woke up.”

He shakes his head. “You need rest in your condition.”

“Dad, after today, I just kind of realized...I want to _live_ ,” she pleads, lip wobbling, despite her determination. “Honestly, I don’t think I’m ever going to get better. I just want...I want a normal life.”

“I know, I know,” he says softly, almost an apology, as he sits on her bed. For a moment, Betty’s eyes water. Maybe he really understands this time—that her near-death experience really made her realize how much she wants to live her life before her disease snuffs it out. He puts a hand around her ankle, his thumb pressing on the bone as he meets her eye. “This is our normal. Now take your medicine.”

The pills feel foreign entering her body. She wants to throw them up, throw them away, scream and cry and beat his chest—but then he’ll just lock her up for days and she’ll have to spend two weeks pretending she’s trapped.

 _Pretending_.

She slams the cup back on the table and waits for the scrape of his lips on her matted, mangled hair.

“Good girl. Be a dear and get some rest.”

He shuts off the light and leaves. Once his footsteps fade, Betty kicks off the covers and heads to the window for a glimpse outside. Shoving open the impossible locks and panels, she’s greeted with the low noise of the city and graveyard.

Maybe she can join them, a cricket in the night.

As she writes in her journal, she hears the soft shift of dirt and a light, little hum. When she peeks outside, there’s not a living soul amidst the garish ad for Cherry Bombshell’s concert, not even a bug.

 _Tomorrow, maybe_ , she hopes, and sketches the face of the man with the blue syringe gun in her bound journal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to @theheavycrown for her encouragement and graphic for this fic. If you happen to have the energy, I'd greatly appreciate your thoughts. Helps me feel connected and motivated, possibly helps me stay afloat from the pit of despair. Plus, I want to talk about how Riverdale MISSED OUT on this as a musical episode hahaha. Do you scream "a little glass vial" in excitement? How do we feel about Riverdale's #1 Serial Killer Dad, and Betty meeting Jughead in a graveyard? Great first date, no? Or do we generally hold higher standards than a cop raid? More to come, bugs ;)


	2. Alleys

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From this point on this fic in unbeta'd so I hope enjoy the madness of my brain. And the genius who wrote Repo! (he looks hella fine/strange in leather as the Graverobber in the movie if you wanna look him up *cough*)

Betty’s knees start to ache on the uncomfortable makeshift perch by the window where she can peek through the curtains to spy on the hunks of graveyard she can see beyond the mortuary roof. There has to be  _ someone _ non-lethal who can give her directions to the concert. Once she has a map, she can get to the festival pavilion and back before Hal returns from surgery.

It’s something, at least. One giant memory she can make for herself.

Originally, Betty had no interest in even  _ watching  _ Cheryl “Cherry Bombshell” Blossom strut around in her signature red, all plastic and autotuned, but once Blind Hermione was announced as an opening act, her heart opened up in wonder.

Hermione sings operatic numbers full of  _ feeling _ , of  _ sorrow _ , and sometimes hope. That’s something Betty needs. Rock is great, but those kinds of bands aren’t usually sponsored by GeneCo and therefore are rarely on public access television. Only acts approved by Cheryl seem to make the cut, like the pop band the Pussycats, although they rarely get a solo act--almost always forced to share with “Cherry Bombshell’s” annoying synthesis.

It’s almost impossible to see anything outside of the glaring lights of billboard ads this late, but if Betty strains, she can _almost_ hear a hum.

_ Digger _ .

He should be safe  _ enough _ . He helped her hide during the raid, at least. That shows some survival instinct.

Hopping off her perch, Betty grabs her bag and slips into her shoes. She sprints down the tunnel and holds her breath instead of using the mask.

Out of habit, she glances at the posed portraits of her mother and sister as she passes them in the mausoleum.  _ Bye, Mom. Bye, Pol _ , she thinks, half-waving as she heads out for an adventure.

Betty creeps around, her all-black ensemble hopefully concealing her movements, blending her in with the shadows and the dead. Although she probably doesn’t need to hold her breath.

Once she’s sure there aren’t any guards or beggars around, Betty calls for the guy she met before, not really knowing what to use as a name. “Digger?”

She doesn’t actually hear dirt moving around tonight.  _ Something  _ is moving, though. Following a gut instinct, she opens a flap of the crypt, remembering how his eyes lit up at the  _ jackpot _ . He was bound to collect.

The stab of flesh and the hum of her ( _ friend? _ ) are unmistakable.

“Hello?” The noises pause. “It’s me! It’s… Betty. From last night.”

“Betty?” A shadow moves amidst the corpses until he raises the blue  _ Zydrate  _ mixture. The glow is enough to highlight his ringed hand and sly face. “Bug, you made it!”

Having only heard the term  _ you made it _ on bad sitcoms where people welcome others into parties, she has a hard time applying it to the current situation, and wrinkles her nose in confusion. “Were you expecting me?”

“Nope. Not at all. Thought that guy took you home and–” He cuts himself off, popping the vial out of his syringe gun and replacing it with a fresh one. “Didn’t see you at the market.”

“Well, he did take me home, I guess. Or someone did. I passed out.” Torn between hurrying to the point and digging for information, Betty swings her legs into the crypt and lets the flap fall shut behind her. Digger’s hard eyes are one of the few things that reflect any kind of light. “Why would he take me to the market?”

He blows out a heavy breath, awkwardly gesturing. “You’re young, pretty. You’ve got all your parts.”

“That’s it?” She kicks her heels against the concrete wall, fully aware of the crusty corpses below. Hunks of them are missing, probably from surgeries. “That basically means I’m alive and relatively unwrinkled.”

His lip twitches and he splays out his hands. “For some people, those are high standards.”

Annoyed, she crosses her arms. The only companions her father lets her keep are stuffed animals and the odd bug, if she kept it in a case. She always hoped that if she  _ were  _ to have friends, it wouldn’t be because of  _ which _ failure her body triggers.

His eyes narrow, his tone dropping its sardonic humor and picking up some defensiveness. “I didn’t mean to offend you or anything. I’m glad you were safe… or something close to it.” Toeing the dried-out carasses around him, he readies the gun. “What brings you back?”

The hiss of the syringe makes her chest squeeze in anticipation. “I wanted to talk to you.”

His scoff rumbles, low and dry. “Really?”

“Also, I wanted to ask for directions.” The incredulous laugh that cracks out of her new friend surprises her, considering the environment. Nothing seems to phase him, so maybe this is normal. Just being  _ outside  _ is weird for her, so she tries not to squirm and make it obvious how unusual all this is.

“Where did you wanna go?”

“There’s a concert. Cheryl–”

“Blossom. Didn’t strike me as your type.” His gaze drifts down to her legs, his eyebrow quirking at her short skirt--it cuts her differently than when she was four inches shorter ordering mourning clothes.

Bristling, Betty pushes off of the ledge and lands on her boots, not caring if she’ll have a hard time climbing up again. The bodies could be stacked as a staircase if needed. “I’m going for Blind Hermione.”

“Mm, the opening act. Classy.”

“Do you have to pass judgment on everything or is that just a habit after spending so much time with the dead?”

He smiles as he presses his knuckles against a skull to prevent it from coming up as he extracts the syringe. “You want to go to a concert.”

“Yes.”

“I’m guessing you don’t have money for a wrist band.”

Rubbing her stockinged thighs together, Betty looks at the corpses, so frayed that she doubts they have anything to take. Two brief encounters with Digger and she’s already considering making them furniture and raiding their pockets.

She really should stop calling him Digger.

“What’s your name?”

The man pauses, looking up at her. Not sure what the big deal is, she raises her eyebrows and waits.

“Jughead.” The way he says it makes her feel like it’s important. Rare. Not just because it’s a nickname she’s never heard before.

“Okay. Jughead.” The name loops in her mind and she’s tempted to write it in her notebook as she nods. “Nice to meet you, Jughead. Officially.” Jughead wrangles the inside of his cheek with his tongue like he’s trying not to laugh at her proffered hand. Still, he shakes it, his grip firm, the rings cold and smooth against her skin--a nip more than a bite. It takes her a second after he’s let go to come back into herself, running her tingling fingers along her arm, then her journal, as if she can imprint the moment on the page. “I was planning on walking and drawing a map. I brought my journal and my pen if you’d be so kind as to help me orient myself. I can manage from there.” 

After wiping the syringe on his jeans, Jughead tucks it back into his belt. “Okay. Let me have it.”

Carefully hopping over a heap of harvested bodies, Betty hands him the pen. “If you could mark the start from the Mausoleum door, that would be great. Feel free to write or draw or… whatever.”

“Turn around.”

She tenses, half expecting an examination, but pleasantly surprised when the journal presses into her back. Jughead uses her as a standing desk. It’s better than being a doll, anyway. The pen flicks between her neck and the key necklace chain around her neck.

“Hey!”

He laughs through the pen cap held in his teeth and an uncomfortable buzz flicks in her gut. Real people’s laughter is a rarity in her life, but she can’t shake the feeling it’s  _ at _ her. Hal doesn’t find much of anything funny. At most, he’ll offer her a tired chuckle for some offhand comment and  _ maybe  _ remember her name with a, “Very good, Betty.”

Half-hoping she finds another flickering creepy crawly, Betty scans the ground. No maggots. No flies. Her bug research indicated humans have sucked up so many chemicals in the last decade via pollution and medications, that bugs no longer found them to be a viable option for decomposition.Still, things evolve. Or die. Much like most humans.

The weight lifts off her shoulders and she turns.

Jughead hands her the journal with a big, shit-eating grin.

“What?”

“You got a crush on me, Bug?”

“What are you talking about?” It’s kind of hard to read his scribbles in the minimal light, but she tries to make them out, anyway.

“Your ink bled through. I saw the sketches.”

Lips parted, she furrows her brows. Her thumb runs over the pages as she flips to the impressions she made of his back, of the tools, of his face. “I was just...remembering.”

He rocks on his feet, taunting, “You wrote about me in your diary and drew my likeness across multiple pages. That’s a pretty solid way of making me a memory.”

Barely suppressing a groan, she fights the heat in her cheeks and tries to focus on his diagrams. “Sorry, I don’t get out much.”

“I can tell.”

Frowning, Betty glances at the spots on his cheek and the curve of his smirk. He’s kind of interesting. Not symmetrical, like the guys on TV. He actually has a relatively small chin and sunken-in eye sockets. Whoever he is, she might be able to figure it out if she puts him down on a page in just the right way.

He arches an eyebrow. “So are you a baby duck or what?”

“What does  _ that  _ mean?”

“Latching onto the first face you see?” She snaps the journal shut and stomps off, but she doesn’t get far before Jughead grabs her around the wrist, smoothing the bone with his thumb. His voice softens, still gripped with a casual sarcasm. “Hey, I’m not used to that being the reason people talk to me, that’s all. I’ll take you to the concert. You’ll get there safely with me.”

Part of her wants to snap at him, tell him she’s not a  _ baby  _ anything. She’s a  _ girl _ . A  _ growing  _ girl with bad blood, yes, but also a brain, and boots, and she can figure it out on her own. Still, it’d probably be easier to navigate the town without her face buried in a book, especially if people are as desperate for organs as her father would lead her to believe.

“Would I get  _ back  _ in one piece?” she challenges, arching a brow.

“Maybe.” His eyes gleam as he squeezes her wrist. She yanks out of his grasp and keeps her arm to her chest as his eyes narrow and lips thin. “Okay, probably. What can I say? Odds aren’t that great these days.” He starts packing his things. “But the offer still stands. I have a few errands on the way and I assume you won’t complain about them.”

“Errands?” She tilts her head. Although she does the laundry and most of the cooking in their house, her father usually does the shopping. His patient house calls can take hours, and often he’ll slink into the lab afterwards to “decontaminate” for even longer. “It depends how much time they’ll take. The only person I want to see is Blind Hermione, so I really can’t miss the opening--and then I have to get back right away, so I doubt I’ll even stay for Cheryl Blossom.”

“All the better.” Jughead’s smooth reply unnerves her, much like when her father agrees to buy her a new book--most often Tracy True--and then holds it over her until she proves she’s taken her medicine.

Betty flips her pen between her fingers. “What are you getting out of this? Why would you help me?” He stiffens, his eyes widening fractionally. “Is it something to do with my disease or the fact that I haven’t had a surgery?”

Nothing in her research indicated her organs should be worth more than anyone else’s. How could they be, when they’re infected with a blood disease? In some ways, it’s rendered her worthless. And this “Zyrdate” only stayed in systems with people who’ve had surgeries so it wasn’t like he could extract anything from her.

Jughead’s throat bobs. “I don’t know.” The metal clink of his suspenders joins the shift of leather as slips his tools into various compartments. “Gut instinct?” His lip twitches up as he leans closer, confessing, “Plus, I’ve always been a sucker for a mystery.”

Morality is relative, according to the philosophy texts in her Dad’s old library. Still, Jughead’s the nicest person she’s ever met, he helped her hide, once, and doesn’t seem to want to overpower her when they’re alone. “Okay,” she relents, “But I think there’s more to it than that.”

Jughead chuckles, pulling the beanie further down on his head. “Sharp yet naive. You’re a hell of an enigma, Bug.”

“Yeah, well, don’t underestimate me.” She tilts her chin up and tucks her journal into her bag, hiding her medicine from his curious gaze.

He lifts one shoulder, clearly not concerned she got him peeking. “I don’t underestimate anyone, kid.”

“I’m not a kid.” Her pulse races at his smirk and it might as well be because of this damn blood disease.

#

Sticking by Jughead means no stopping for directions, but she can tell by the way he’s moving that they’re not following his initial diagram. “Why are we using all back alleys?”

“They’re more familiar and faster. Safer, for the most part,” he adds wryly, taking her hand, “At least for me.”

That doesn’t make sense to her, especially not with the slow-shifting bodies perched in the alley or above on the high-rises with glazed eyes and shaking limbs. But his hand feels nice encompassing hers and she feels safer towed through the alley like it’s a maze and  _ he  _ knows the answers. “Okay.”

She scans the unfamiliar posters on the walls, most of them sporting some form of graffiti.

_ Are you addicted to surgery? You’re not alone! _

_ Join the Gen-Terns and learn the ins and outs of your ins and outs. _

_ Say no to street-grade Zydrate! _

Underneath, a small asterisk with the suggestion,  _ Ask your surgeon about payment plans, today! _

“Jughead?” The breathy way someone says his name makes Betty’s palms itch underneath her sweat-soaked fingerless black gloves, and she squeezes his hand tightly. A girl with glazed round eyes and stiff fuschia hair emerges from a stairwell. “I need a hit.”

With a grim set to his mouth, Jughead glances down the alley. “The other one way supposed to last you for the weekend. Are you making your loan payments?”

“I pay the minimum! Come on, Tall Boy’s been on my ass and I’m so stressed and--” The girl practically crawls closer, her voice hushed. “I can’t trust anyone else’s isn’t laced with other shit.”

Jughead sighs and looks away. “What have you got?”

The girl starts to unbuckle her top. While Betty is by no means a prude–she’s seen Cheryl Blossom put it all out there with her backup dancers and read enough on anatomy not to be phased by _parts_ –she didn’t think people took their breasts out on the street, no matter how excited they were about a recent augmentation.

Much to Betty’s chagrin, Jughead drops her hand to take the money the pink-haired girl fishes out of her bra.

Jughead looks both ways before tucking the money into his pocket and jerking his chin. “Where do you want it?”

“Neck.” The girl drops to her knees, patting her tendons like she’s putting on foundation instead of touching a real part of her body.

Betty backs up against the wall, torn between drawing this strange exchange and turning away. Jughead draws the gun from its holster and loads up a vial. It’s sort of horrifying and intimate, the way he pulls the pink hair aside and finds the vein in her neck with two fingers before pressing the needle against her skin.

A prickly part of her remembers that her father sometimes has to find a vein in her forearm and it’s not anything near tender. It’s part of the job. That’s what Jughead’s doing. Still, she swallows and imagines Jughead’s thumb tracing down the pale blue veins. Not that anyone would admire her bloodwork.

It’s a fantasy.

As soon as Jughead presses the trigger, Betty jumps at the noise of air whooshing out, the spark of blue flashing and fading as the woman’s eyes roll back in her head with a low, groaning wail.

Jughead backs up, wiping the needle on his jeans and watching for a moment as if to assess if they’re done. The girl writhes on the floor, eyes half-closed. 

Cringing, Betty isn’t sure whether to run forward and use her pen as a tongue depressor or stay put. “Is she okay?”

Jughead drags the groaning woman in front of an advert for Cheryl Blossom that reads,  _ Cherry-Bomb Bad Habits Like Zydrate Addiction _ . “She’ll be fine. This is her favorite fantasy.”

“Shooting up in a dark alley?”

For a moment, Jughead stares at her, frozen, bewildered. He looks like he’s torn between a lecture and laughter. Finally, he shakes his head and reloads his gun. “For whatever reason, Toni likes visiting Miss Blossom in her Zydrate-fueled fantasies.”

“Mmm, spectacular,” the girl murmurs, running a hand along her corset.

Betty crosses her arms. “So it’s… an addictive hallucinogenic pain medication?” Any adverts for surgery had such tiny print that Betty was rarely able to make out the warnings on her old, fuzzy television set. Her father’s medical journals only had so much in it. “Why would that make her…” Betty rubs her arms and looks away as the girl gropes her own breast. “Aroused?”

“It’s also a stimulant.” Wagging his eyebrows, he holds up the gun in a dramatic, boyish way, like he’s a rogue detective. ”Numbs you out so any touch feels good.”

“Oh.” The glint in his eyes forces her lungs to expand far too big for her chest. Not wanting to appear like a sex-averse  _ kid _ , Betty straightens her spine and fidgets her hands. “Do you… enjoy it?”

Jughead tsks and holsters the gun. “Never use the product.”

_ But what’s your fantasy _ ? She wants to clarify.

Before she can dig deeper, a ruckus just up the alley draws their attention.

Cheryl Blossom in all her red leather glory storms through the crowd, shoving people aside if they happen to be stumbling in the center of the street. For someone so skinny, she’s strong and powerful. Maybe that confidence comes with fortune, fame, and two buff bodyguards in leather dominatrix gear.

“Graverobber!” Cheryl barks.

Jughead rolls his eyes and prepares a vial before she’s even spotted him. After he jerks his chin, Betty ducks under the stairs and pretends to be busy with her black bound book.

“Graverobber!” Cheryl repeats, this time decidedly more vicious as she storms through the alley. “Sometimes I wonder why I even bother.”

“Ah, for once, her lyrics rhyme.”

Scowling, she snags the meat of his jacket with her red talons and shoves him against the wall. For some reason, he lets her.

“Where were you last night?”

Chin held high, Jughead levels her with a passive, irritated look. “Restocking since the last time you cleaned me out. Had to hide, since the guards were hunting again.” 

She clucks, annoyed, and turns awayt. “Daddy’s been stingy, lately.” Moaning, Toni crawls forward to pull at her boot, only for Cheryl to shake her off. “Get your sapphic hands off me, Scalpel Slut! I need a hit, not a  _ hand _ .”

“Cash or Credits?” Jughead ignores the scene in front of him with what seems like practiced indifference. Or maybe he’s used to people crawling, begging, and kicking their way to what they want. Life on the outside is different than what they show on T.V. Even though Betty’s known that, it’s still unnerving. The iron rails of the stairs remind Betty of the rattling gate by her house, and she can feel her crescent scars sweat, sticking to the fingerless gloves.

Cheryl puts her hands on her hips and gives Jughead an incredulous look. “I’m good for it.”

Sauntering around, Jughead shrugs. “Mmm, yes, but Daddy’s made it infinitely harder for me to do my job, and I’m guessing he’s made it trickier for you to get away to make your payments, so I’ll ask again: how would you like to make your purchase today?”

For a moment, Cheryl wiggles her body like she’s about to offer it, then shakes her head with a grim set to her mouth. The idea of Jughead taking this woman in the alley makes Betty feel nauseous outside of a blood disease. “Cash,” the redheaded heir declares.

“Glad to hear it.”

Does everyone keep money in their underwear, Betty wonders, as Cheryl fishes it out of her bra and Jughead stuffs it down his pants. “And as for an advance on your next service, how about a few concert tickets with a backstage pass?”

“Ha! Fine, hobo, but you better not embarrass anyone.”

Cheryl snaps at Jughead to follow her to a slightly more secluded portion of the alley, her bodyguards migrating like mindless moths drawn to red leather instead of neon light. “Entry can’t be visible today.”

Frowning, Jughead appraises her plentiful white skin. “That knocks out the neck.” Neither of them seem phased when he gets on one knee and she spreads her legs. Jughead traces a vein at the apex of her thighs, under her hot pants. He’s not touching her genitals, obviously, just the seam of her leg somewhere, but it still makes Betty’s blood boil to witness it.

Maybe she’s angry. And inexperienced. But mostly, she’s upset, trapped.

Sometimes it feels like that’s  _ all  _ she is.

Jughead unclips one suspender and ties it around Cheryl’s thigh, flicking the flesh in a way that makes her heart wobble. It’s a tourniquet. She’s familiar, as her father’s had to find her veins before for testing. Part of her wants to feel the prick of Jughead’s nails against her flesh, or the slap, her skin pinking underneath.

Cheeks heating, she turns to her journal so as not to intrude as Jughead gets ready for the injection.

Jotting down a brief diagram of needle entry spots in her journal and notes about _fantasies_ makes her feel a little better. At least it’s something added to her arsenal. She doesn’t even realize anyone’s noticed her until Cheryl stumbles forward in her thigh-high boots and slaps the notebook from her hands. “Are you some kind of journalist?” The heiress wobbles and slurs in the aftermath of her injection. “If I find this account written on some bathroom wall, I’ll have my bodyguards shave you bald and reclaim all your parts, bitch! And that’s _before_ I get my family involved.”

Although Betty saw tabloids littered in the alley about the “incestuous” and corrupt nature of the Blossoms, Betty certainly hasn’t fed into any of it. Besides, at this point, a death threat from Cheryl Blossom is more surreal than intimidating. “I’m not doing anything.”

She picks up the journal only for Cheryl to snatch it right out of her hands again. Apparently, organ theft isn’t the only thing Betty has to defend herself against.

“Keep up the innocent act and the only thing you’ll be doing is  _ rotting _ .” Blood red talons tear the anatomy drawings right out of their bindings and Cheryl shoves the whole mess against Betty’s chest.

Horrified, Betty stares at the crumpled paper, poison thumping through her veins. Lashing out at her father usually led to being restrained to the bed and doped up for a few days.  _ Here _ ...here, though...outside…

Her fingers flex into her palms, around her pen, knowing how much force it would take to turn the pen into a needle.

“Cool it, Cheryl. The girl is training as an apprentice,” Jughead interrupts, pushing the heiress towards her bodyguards, who catch her slumping frame and fan her with their giant palms.

Head rolling back, Cheryl narrows her eyes on them. “I thought you freaks worked alone.”

“Normally, yes. But seeing as the demand has increased lately, I could use an extra set of hands–especially ones that aren’t reaching for the product.” He glances at her fingerless gloves, then her mini-skirt. “Plus, she’s a Cherry Bomber.”

Betty avoids eye contact, trying to stuff and smooth the pages back in their bindings. There’s no way she can sell that idea when flustered by the attack, but Jughead continues laying it on thick as Cheryl glares. “She does fanart.”

Cheryl jabs her elbows into her bodyguards to clamber up to full height. Her giant red mouth moves slower under the influence. “I’m already a work of art.”

“Y--yes,” Betty agrees, glancing at the fuschia-haired girl, who’s still glazed out and longing, then Jughead, who mildly jerks his head to encourage her to keep going. “You’re an artist. Spectacular.”

Pulling back, Cheryl blinks, then calms. “Follow me.” After flicking her long curls over her shoulder, Cheryl climbs onto one of her bodyguard’s backs using the leather and chains strapped to their bodies for stirrups.

Jughead taps Betty’s arm with his knuckles, the metal of rings cool against her skin. “Come on, Bug. We’ve got a show to catch.” With a sympathetic glance at her journal, his mouth pulls in what she thinks is an attempted smile before following Cheryl and her henchmen.

Grateful and confused, Betty stuffs the journal back into her bag and hurries after them. The bodyguards and Jughead all have much longer legs so it feels like it takes her twice as much effort to keep up. There’s no time to try and memorize how to get back later–or even take in much of what the alleys are like when she’s scurrying so quickly.

Jughead gestures for her to hurry up, palm outstretched. Without thinking, she grabs his hand and trots to keep up. He laughs at her a little, the bemused twinkle in his eye at her outstanding effort bordering on condescending.

At least he’s getting her to the concert.

To Betty’s surprise, Cheryl and her goons had parked her limo right in the alley. “Is it safe to leave this here?”

“My boys get rid of any drugged-out loonis,” Cheryl informs her, sleepily, ironically, as she loops her hair around her fingers, “Besides, if anyone messes with me, JayJay comes looking.”

Betty suppresses the urge to unfurl like a centipede and wriggle away. She follows Jughead into the shiny vehicle to find Blind Hermione and feel something for the day besides irritation.

It’s the first time Betty can remember being in a car and she isn’t quite sure what to do with herself. The tinted windows protect anyone from seeing Cheryl dancing to a beat no one else can hear, groping her own body. She’s panting like she’s overheated. Leather squeaks under her legs, much louder than any of the muffled advertisements outside. Stoic behind their sunglasses, the bodyguards seem fine with Cheryl writhing around on top of them as her music plays in the background. The purr of the motor makes Betty uneasy, wishing she could hold Jughead’s hand again.

_ Only babies need to hold someone’s hand _ , Polly used to tell her. At least, she thinks she did. There aren’t really any journals from back then for her to rely on to make sure she remembers.

For his part, Jughead seems keen on staying out of sight, slouched in his seat and watching the window, one hand on his gun, his pinkly stroking what she thinks is a switchblade.

Cheryl’s eyes flutter closed. “My Cherry Stems will give you the wrist bands while I get tucked.”

_ Stems?  _ She thinks, looking at the two burly men flanking the heiress’s side.  _ Tucked? _

“Don’t ask,” Jughead advises. He clamps a hand on her knee, rubbing a thumb across the seam of her stockings. Warmth blooms with the suddenness of a million spiders crawling under her skin.

Despite the air conditioning, her palms sweat.

Jughead and the bodyguards seem fine, so it might be something that affects girls or something about her blood disease. Blocking her journal with a cupped hand, she scribbles a few more questions.

“How often do you write in that thing?”

“Every day.”

He makes a noncommittal noise and looks out the tinted window. “Must be nice.”

It beats waiting for death and playing with stuffed animals, most of the time. “Do you write?”

With a glance at Cheryl and the guards, he shakes his head. “Not much. There isn’t a lot of time, what with having to pay the bills and all.”

“Oh.”

Betty scoots closer to him and tries to see whatever’s got his attention outside. The buildings are all fairly dark and unimpressive, posters and tabloids the only vibrant bursts of orange throughout the trip. Even though it’s not visually exciting, at least it’s not the same four walls day in and day out. She wonders what the world is really like–if it changes every day or once a month or… at all. By the time they pull up to the venue, Cheryl’s half-unconscious and the bodyguards have to carry her out.

“Is she gonna be okay?”

“To perform? Or in general? Because either way, she’s an addict with a huge ego and lots of money to spend on her self-image.” Jughead helps Betty out first, his hand on the small of her back when no one else is looking. It feels steady and warm and makes her hyper-aware of the sweat collecting at the dip, but as soon as he lets go, she misses the contact.

Cheryl drops into a makeup chair and yells, “Do I need to get a dick attached just to get a Gen-Tern’s attention?”

Betty watches, intrigued and slightly repulsed as a woman in a flimsy excuse of a nurse uniform teeters to Cheryl’s side. Medical professionals should be wearing smocks, like her father, right? Although Hal’s always been a bit severe. The lack of clothing probably doesn’t affect their abilities. At Cheryl’s slurred direction, the woman draws tiny slits on Cheryl’s face while another wheels in a medical cart.

The sterile smell of the dressing room with its medical equipment far too reminiscent of Betty’s own house. She touches Jughead’s newly-tied wristband. “I’m going to step outside.”

“I’ll come with,” he says, and she takes his hand without even thinking about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eeeeey she got out of the house! She met Cheryl and lived to tell the tale! I hope the world here makes sense but as always feel free to message me if you have questions. I LIVE FOR YOUR THOUGHTS! Or at least I keep posting fic for them haha. You excited for the concert pavilion? Hear some glorious Blind Hermione? And Cheryl? Honestly, I'm here for the hand holding. No one is surprised by this but such is life. How are you?


	3. Playground

The urban fairgrounds of the concert are tightly packed with tents, miniature rides, and excited, eccentric fans. They don’t seem feral–not like the people who rattled the gates at the graveyard. Everyone’s smiling or strutting or huddled in packs to absorb the atmosphere and decide what to indulge in next. A man in a diamond-patterned jacket contorts while his companions waggles his eyebrows and shows off his stretchy, flame-retardant esophagus by sliding a burning sword down to his gullet.

Betty tucks herself against Jughead’s side. “Do people often get cosmetic surgeries?” According to her father, most of it was life-or-death.

“If they’re rich.” Jughead shrugs, the derision clear by his tone.

She studies his pretty face in the bright lights of the fairground. “Have you ever had any?”

“Ha!” He slaps her shoulder, moving his hand up to massage a spot up near her neck. “No. Can’t afford to mess with perfection.”

“Perfection doesn’t exist.” At that, Jughead slows his gait and appraises her with what she can only guess is amusement. Or pride. But she hasn’t been on the receiving end of either emotion for a long time. Or any. She squirms and rolls her neck back into his hand. “So what surgeries have you had?”

“Liver. Runs in the family. Always had an iron stomach, though.” His gaze shifts to a food stall before she can wriggle out if he’s being serious. “Have you ever seen one of these?” He eagerly snags and gnaws on a complimentary meat and veggie-laden delicacy labeled as a  _ kabob _ . Some people stick them down their throats like the burning sword man, but since Betty doesn’t have that kind of upgraded esophagus, she’s not sure how to eat it. Jughead seems content to bite from the side and let the flesh of it hang on by a thread before sucking it from the stick. The way his tongue dips along the prong makes the fine hairs of her neck stand on end. Licking his lips, Jughead eyes her with just the hint of a challenge. “Go on, kid.”

“I’m not a kid.”

“Glad to hear it.” He smirks and finishes the stick before tossing it in the trash and grabbing two more.

The red peppers are brighter than anything Betty’s had at home. Jughead wraps his teeth around a curved slice, prying it off the stick with a practiced flourish. He hasn’t dropped dead or replaced his esophagus, so Betty musters up her courage to take a treat from the stand.

“Is it fresh or synthetic?” Dad warned her about various side effects on the intestines and the last thing she wants to do is run to the bathroom with Jughead as her… guide? Date?

“It’s delicious,” Jughead offers through a mouthful of partially-transparent food, sucking the snack without a care.

With an exasperated sigh, she leans forward to take a nibble. It’s the same color as the candy she wasn’t allowed to have on Halloween. It tastes different, though. Sweet, but watery. Meaty.

“You like it?” Jughead flexes his shoulders back, sticking his chest out.

“It’s...different. Good different,” she decides, trying the yellow pepper, which burns her tongue.

“The Blossoms always cater towards a red theme. Try the maple syrup sauce on the ribs. It’s disgustingly classic.”

She laughs, enjoying the way he drags her off and devours everything in sight. The sweet tang of ribs sticks to her teeth and she feels awkward sucking it off in front of anyone.

Not that anyone sees  _ her  _ as a particular curiosity. The atmosphere is different than what she’s seen on television. They’re not all mindless crowds focused on one particular thing. There are tons of subgroups. People gossip in corners, they flirt and giggle, showing each other peeks of their latest surgeries. Genterns in their miniscule nurse outfits and visors hand out information on upgrades people can purchase such as improved hearing for the show with multiple frequency possibilities.

“No cure for a blood disease, huh?”

Jughead shoots her an odd look. “Would you want to replace it? That’s… I can’t even imagine that debt. You’d be repo’d and dead within a year. Unless you have a way to pay it back...”

“What are you talking about?”

Jughead dusts off his fingers before leading her towards the louder section of the venue, near the rides. “You seem healthy enough. But let’s say GeneCo drains your blood and pumps you full of an upgraded version so you never get exhausted again. Your life would belong to them.”

People scream gleefully as a tower ride plummets downward. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know about your daddy, but most people can’t afford the payments with interest. They end up with the Repo Man breathing down their necks and become part of his weird, twisted messages.”

“Repo Man? Weird messages?” She fumbles for her journal.

“Yeah, he’d take it back.”

“Take what back?”

“The blood, as well as anything else he can salvage.” An unsettling sense of entrapment settles over her. The posters on the walls for cosmetic surgeries don’t really balance the idea of  _ taking it back  _ in her head. It’s not like they could take back nose jobs or face lifts, but heart transplants? Livers?

“Is the Repo Man a serial killer or…?”

“Rumor has it, he’s a GeneCo employee. Of course, Clifford doesn’t let the press frame it like that.” Jughead flicks his thumb against his lip and looks both ways. “He’s a scare tactic.”

“So it’s a choice with what’s worse: dying slowly from illness or getting hunted and murdered?”

“Hey, you can also slowly work yourself to death!” he offers with false levity.

She rolls her eyes. “How could I forget? Well, I guess it’s weird to wrap my head around, because my dad is always working to help save people’s lives. But he’s not dying. I don’t think he’s ever had a surgery, either. So I don’t… I don’t know,” she trails off, hugging herself and biting her lip, remembering the bright red heart from the freezer. A normal part of the lab. “He must be using those organs for treatment.”

Jughead sighs. “GeneCo does resell its reclaimed organs for yet another profit. Gently used, mostly functional, slight discount, if you don’t mind risking an infection.” When she frowns at him, he clears his throat and gestures to a line with his chin. “I can hold onto the bag so you can go on the rides, if you want.”

The idea of wandering into the crowd alone makes her heart pound fast, especially without her bag. “You aren’t coming?”

“Not yet. I have a covert mission.” He wags his eyebrows.

“Can’t I come?”

Rubbing the back of his beanie, Jughead falters. “Uh, probably best if it’s solo.”

Betty widens her eyes and tilts her head. “But I thought you said I could become your apprentice.”

He grimaces and leans away from her. “You didn’t really believe that?”

Scoffing, he snaps her head back, annoyed that her tactic didn’t work. “No. Of course not.” She fiddles with her bag, trying to ignore the squirmy, worm feeling in her chest. “You also said I was a Cherry fan, so obviously you have no problem lying.” Her fingers wrap around her bag strap. “I’ll hang onto this, if it’s all the same to you, thanks.”

With a grim smile, he nods. “I’ll see you for the concert, Bug.”

“It’s  _ Betty _ .”

Hesitating, he glances at a ride, where people scream, hands flung up. To Betty, they seem fairly heart rate-inducing, which probably isn’t the greatest idea for someone with a blood disease. “How about one ride before I go?”

He’s only asking out of pity, probably, but it’s her one chance, so she bites her lip and shrugs. “We only live once. Borrowed time, and all that.”

He chuckles and claps his hand on the back of her shoulder, guiding her into line.

People drop their bags by the fences before climbing onto their carts and no one tries to steal anything--not even Jughead, who keeps his stuff strapped to him, though he notices her looking at his various pockets and straps.

With a wink, he shifts something around in his trousers.

“What if the glass shatters?”

“Oh, I’m sure there’s a Zur-gen on hand to sell me reconstructive surgery,” he says flippantly, rolling his eyes as they both clamber into a cart. “Assuming I don’t get arrested.”

Bracing herself, Betty tucks her bag into her clothes and clings to a bar that falls into her lap. Jughead smirks and taps her hand.

“It’ll be fine, kid.”

“I’m not a--”

The ride lurches forward and she shrieks amidst Jughead’s chuckle, ducking under his arm as he lays it out behind her. “Open your eyes,” he shouts. “You only live once, and that’s only if you can afford it!”

Teeth chattering, she tries to take it in, the way his jacket flaps at the speed, the heat of his chest, the way the world blurs in a different way than when she hasn’t taken her meds. It’s bright. Intense. Flying by faster than she can take it in, and she  _ feels him _ , Jughead, through all of it.

The ride spins and dips and plummets towards the ground until Betty’s screaming - _ screaming, laughing,  _ the wind whipping against her face, and it’s  _ amazing _ .

After a few rounds, dizzy and securing her wig, she stumbles off the ride, holding Jughead’s hand. “How was it?”

“Fantastic! Can we go on the rest?”

“There aren’t  _ that  _ many today because of the concert, but I’m sure you’ll enjoy the rest.” Adjusting his pockets, Jughead turns to a medical tent.

“Oh. Right. You have to--you have work.” Feigning a smile, Betty nods. “Well, thanks for the ride.”

“Anytime, kid. Uh, Bug,” he corrects, saluting her as he saunters away, “I’ll find you in about fifteen minutes.”

“Not if I find you, first,” she jabs, her stomach fluttering when he lets out a boyish laugh.

Spinning on her heel, Betty delves into the crowd and grips either her pen or her bag strap to keep from grinding her nails into her palms. This is the chance of a lifetime.

Although it’s fun to wander around, people watching, sketching,  _ living _ , restlessness kicks in her veins. She wants to ask everyone a million questions but every time she tries to engage, she gets giggles or weird looks and it seems better to observe than directly engage. And going on the rides isn’t any fun with a stranger or by herself. These people aren’t like Jughead. Or her. And that’s strange, but okay.

She wanders towards a tent labeled: _The Fizzle Den_ : _Legal Edibles_ _and Zydrate Packs._

That seems like the kind of place Jughead would try to sell his wares.

There’s a lot of wild, pealing laughter coming from inside. People suck on a hard crystal candy while others snort its powder. The price tag’s outrageous! Even if she  _ did  _ have money like that, why waste it on a snack? Judging by the way people keep coming in, it must be really delicious. A handful of the customers--mostly women--get herded into a private access area by the Gen-terns labeled  _ The Playpen. _

“Come on, pretty little thing,” a Gen-tern insists, grabbing her arm and pulling her past the archway with them, “Free samples for the playpen!”

Maybe  _ playing  _ with people wouldn’t be so bad. Everyone in the semi-secluded tent seems to be open to physical contact and there has to be some kind of refreshment to take her medicine with.

Two middle-aged women keep rubbing each other’s arms while a group of men in the corner eat popcorn, kernels flying out their mouths.

A particularly grating voice catches her attention. “Someone’s gonna hang if I don’t get my coffee.” The Gen-tern drops her arm and books it back outside, leaving Betty bewildered and alone to turn to the disgruntled playmate.

A clerk in a white-down shirt and black vest shivers. “I have decaf.”

“I will  _ shoot you in the face! _ ” The customer with slicked-back red hair points his finger like a trigger. For a horrible moment, Betty wonders if he had his hands modified, but everyone besides the server ignores the scene, scampers off, or laughs.

Some other server saunters up, relaxed and droopy-eyed. “Here’s your coffee, Mr. Blossom.”

_ Blossom.  _ From behind, she didn’t realize it was Jason, or “JayJay,” the GeneCo heir and Cheryl’s twin, though the flaming orange hair should’ve given it away. He’s rarely onscreen with his family as more than a blurry figure in all white in the background.  _ Better to bleach away the blood _ , some of the tabloids said.

One day out and Betty’s already run into GeneCo royalty? If he’s anything like his sister, Betty has zero interest in being in the same space as him. She disengages from the person who dragged her in and slips the crowd, scanning for Jughead. Jason sputters in the background.

“What’s this? Rat piss?” A scuffle breaks out in that corner along with a strange hiss of air that sounds like the exhale of a syringe.

In their hurry to get to the drama, people slam past her. It’s so many  _ hands _ , so many people brushing past that it’s overwhelming. Strangers. Touching. Not thinking anything of it.

Apparently, she doesn’t move fast enough, eliciting a guy to protest,“Hey!”

“Sorry.” She cringes into herself, wishing she could be a spider crawling safely above them instead of a girl in black. Observing first makes everything easier.

The man smooths back thick, dark hair and rakes his gaze over her like he’s seeing her for the first time and hadn’t just smashed into her shoulder. “Bump into me any time, sweet thing.” The sentiment strikes her as strange and insincere. Then again, she doesn’t have much experience with flirting, dating, or… anything.

Part of her wonders if Jughead’s ever hit on her, if that’s what his comforting touches were. It’s hard to read him sometimes. This guy is objectively attractive, she supposes, but his skin has an eerie absence of freckles and beauty marks. His face is smooth with sculpted cheekbones. He has inflated muscles and long, synthetic eyelashes that remind her of a doll.

“How old are you, sweetheart? You want some candy?”

Scratching her arm, she looks around for whatever snack he’s offering. Not that she’d take it, necessarily. “Are you talking about the free samples?”

“No, I’m talking about the good stuff, sweetie. I can get you everything you need.”

“Reggie!” The snarl that comes from behind practically sprays her with its rage. She turns, shocked to find herself face to face with Jason Blossom, who appears to be  _ wearing  _ a second face in some grim tribute to something she doesn’t understand. A horror movie? An art film? The stitches look painful, but solid. Would that even be temporary? The tabloids had said something about an argument with his father,  _ disfigurement _ , but… nothing about  _ wearing a second face _ . Couldn’t they afford reconstructive surgery? His second set of lips are painted in the same shade as Cheryl’s and he snarls at Reggie. “I need a new shirt. Trade me.”

With a big sigh, Reggie shrugs off his blazer and starts unbuttoning, making a big show of flexing for Betty’s benefit. Seeing a guy get shirtless in front of her is  _ kind  _ of interesting from a scientific standpoint, maybe even more than that, but once she catches sight of the red splatter staining Jason’s white button-down shirt, goosebumps break out on her skin. Maybe it was from the maple syrup sauce. Somehow, she doubts it.

As she tries to get out of their way, Jason cages her in. “Who’s this?”

On TV, Jason usually isn’t  _ talking _ , just hovering in the wings like he’s his father’s understudy. In person, he’s intimidating, far more of a presence than she ever imagined he could be.

He’s tall, with inhuman, sparking blue eyes, almost orange-red crusted hair, and even more delicate eyelashes than his friend.

“Some shy sweetie looking for candy,” Reggie teases. “I kinda want to test out my new equipment with someone who will let me do anything, but there’s also the temptation to go with someone who knows how it works. What do you think? Try this one out or go for some Gen-terns?”

Bristling, Betty crosses her arms and steps back. “I didn’t ask you for candy.”  _ And I’m not your sweetie _ , she wants to add, but Reggie’s already eyeing a Gen-tern who’s tracing the edge of her bra, so she doubts she has much to worry about.

Jason creeps forward, head tilting on the same axis as a praying mantis. “You look familiar.”

That's impossible. She never leaves her house.

Reggie slings on his blazer, glancing distastefully at all the ways it doesn’t cover Jason’s stains. “That’s probably because you’ve fucked half the town.” Sighing, he eyes her one more time, clearly finding her wanting. “I think I want to sit back and relax for this one. Sorry, sweetie. Maybe next time.” Jason lingers, staring hard enough that it feels like he’s trying to squeeze her throat, or maybe peel back her gloves. It’s a strange, slightly violating sensation. Huffing, Reggie tugs at the crotch of his pants. “Come on, J-Dog, I don’t have another shirt to spare and I wanna party before the set. Let’s go. I’ll get the fucking coffee you wanted.”

Jason’s demeanor shifts smoother than her father’s does, all smiles and ease under his mask. “Sounds delicious. Until next time.” He reveals a garish grin, red gums and large teeth, before sauntering away like nothing happened and the world wasn’t close to shifting. The guys head to a tent with a few Gen-terns whose eyes glitter behind clear, plastic face shields at their salacious suggestions.

Still reeling, Betty’s nails grate through the fingerless gloves as the world blurs in and out of focus. What appears to be the relaxed server’s bloody body is hauled through one of the slats in the tent.

He just murdered somebody.

Nobody did anything.

People die… are dying… and yet, this isn’t the organ-hungry world her father told her about. It’s almost worse. It’s apathy.

Her wrist vibrates, her watch reminding her to take her medicine.

Fumbling through her bag, Betty sniffs, wondering where the hell she’s supposed to get normal water in this place because there’s no way she’s going over to the coffee stand.

A hand slithers across her back. Shivering, she falls forward, half-expecting her neck to be snapped as she whirls around.

“Hey!” Jughead holds his hands up, frowning. “Are you okay?”

Mute, she nods.

“You fucking scared me!” he snaps, nostrils flaring. “How the fuck did you get into the Playpen? You barely look old enough to sample! You’re okay? They didn’t touch you or anything, did they?”

Betty gags, then shakes her head.

Jughead’s grip tightens on her shoulder. “Stay away from those guys. That Blossom prick is absolutely out of his membrane.” Betty nods again, but this time there’s a time lapse, a jarring disposition of color as her limbs go slack. “Fuck, are you okay? Talk to me.” He cups her cheeks, gently urging her to look at him. His gaze darts worriedly across her face.

“I…”

Memories flit and fuzz across her brain.

Hal, raging about his shirts going missing. Polly hiding in the bathroom. The ring of slaps.

_Bad blood._

_Family._

“Betts!”

She crashes into his chest, the world snuffed out in an instant. Just pressure. Darkness. And arms wrapped tightly around her, protective and warm. If she does have to die, it isn't the worst way to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry, but I don't think I'll be posting my fics or their updates much on tumblr anymore. I of course love to hear your thoughts, though! The wonderful comments you've left so far are the only reason I've kept posting at all! Thank you again for your support and have a wonderful day!


	4. Pulse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things get PG-13 so be prepared for teenagery hormone feelings/smooching/hands

As she awakens, Betty struggles against the urge to vomit.

“Drink some water. It might help,” Jughead says so reasonably that she wonders if he's used to helping people like this, if his... not-quite-surgeries require aftercare.

Barely coherent, Betty rights herself and looks up at Jughead, comfortable against his chest. “H…” Her throat feels like it’s swollen three sizes.

The wet, cool rag he presses to her skin makes the world shiver into focus again. Did she  _ have  _ to have an episode in front of him? How many times was he going to see her pass out or something else that paints her as inept?

She hurriedly takes the small cup of water and downs it. Everything already feels the tiniest bit more manageable. “Sorry.”

“Hey, it’s not  _ my  _ concert.”

“The concert!” Darting upwards, Betty looks around. “Is it happening?” A song thuds nearby. Grabbing Jughead’s hand, she half-stumbles out of the tent and drags him to the backstage area labelled so thoroughly even  _ she  _ can find it. The opening notes of Blind Hermione’s latest hit swell from the stage.

“Oh my god.”

The vibrations of her idol’s voice shudder through her chest.

This is  _ live music _ .

It’s like it’s a part of her or something - the beat rumbling through her chest and tainted blood with a tender caress.

Hot tears of excitement streak down her cheeks. She’s trembling,  _ feeling _ , her veins bubbling and her heart pounding along with her eardrums. People sway and cry and cheer to Blind Hermione’s emotive performance, her dark hair thick and piled atop her head with pins, garish makeup accentuating her eyes like spiders around the white webbing of her camera-fed technology. Betty doesn’t care what she looks like, even though she does love the elegant, shimmering gown and the black pearls around her neck. It’s the  _ voice  _ that captures her.

Betty leans back into Jughead, guiding his arms around her in a hug like she sees some of the other audience members doing. Although he stiffens initially, the moment she turns to check if she’s doing something wrong, he tightens around her and sways from side to side, a small smile on his face.

This is  _ living _ .

As her fingers thread into his, an almost wistful flutter takes off in her chest. Blood disease or not, she’s going to miss this side effect.

The lights flare up so suddenly they’re almost blinding. Hermione takes the microphone with the detached, quiet sadness she seems to carry on her back and gestures to the wings. “Thank you, as always, to my generous benefactors, the Blossoms.” The crowd hoots and hollers. Betty hangs onto Jughead’s wrists, playing with his leather bracelets and rings, fitting their fingers together. “As we wait for Cheryl–” A boo weasels through the crowd, then a shot. Flinching, Betty snuggles tighter into Jughead’s arms.

His breath is hot and sweet on her face. “Time to go, Bug.”

As Jughead leads Betty through the crowd, the color drains from Hermione’s face.

“The concert next week will be my farewe–”

“Well, well, well.” Clifford Blossom appears onstage in one of his more demure wigs and a nice sport coat. “Thank you for that, Hermione.” He snatches the microphone out of her hands, and she swallows hard, turning towards the crowd with a frown. “As my daughter gets ready to launch her latest song, I just wanted to thank Hermione for being part of our GeneCo  _ family _ .” Hacking into a red handkerchief, the patriarch of the Blossom family spits and wipes his mouth. Perhaps  _ he  _ has a blood disease. Maybe it’s his lungs. They edit out any illnesses on television programs unless it’s to advertise a surgery or drug to fix it. “You don’t know how much it means to us that you’ve agreed to renew your contract.”

“But I–”

“Now, everyone, everyone…”

They start chanting some kind of strange song, but Betty’s too put off by the reemergence of the man with the stitches on his face to absorb the lyrics. Jason gleefully half-drags, half-dances Cheryl onto the stage, holding her up and stroking her face with exaggerated dance moves like her limp body is a puppet to play with.

“What is he doing with her?”

“Anybody’s guess when it comes to the Blossoms.”

As Betty and Jughead make their way out of the labyrinthine backstage, they almost collide with a flurry of black fabric.

Air whooshes out Betty’s lungs and her legs turn to jelly. Blind Hermione doesn’t even blink in surprise - she doesn’t  _ need  _ to, with those eyes. Words tumble out of Betty’s mouth and she’s barely even coherent of what she’s saying. “I can’t wait to hear your next album. I’m so–”

“Late! Come on, we have to get you home.” Jughead may be well-meaning as he nudges her onwards, but this is her  _ one chance  _ to say hello.

Beaming at her idol, Betty drags her feet. “You’ve helped me through so much of my life–”

“Betty!” He tugs her hand again, motioning to the chaos breaking out on the stage beyond them.

Hermione stares, her GeneCo-upgraded eyes flickering like an error code on one of the billboards. “Betty?”

Before they can talk more, they hear the grumblings of Clifford backstage. “How the hell did she get more Zydrate? Find her dealer and bring them to me.”

Exchanging a wide-eyed glance, Jughead and Betty bolt out of the venue. It’s the second time she’s run, the first being the chase in the graveyard. It’s hard to breathe and her feet clunk heavily against the dirt. Jughead hops into a metal truck and she throws herself in after him.

“Ugh!” Betty coughs, covering her mouth and nose as the plastic bags and cardboard underneath her give way. “It  _ reeks _ .” To her dismay, the garbage truck doesn’t have anything interesting in it. At least she doesn’t see any needles sticking out.

“It goes past the graveyard and the shell will keep us safe,” Jughead offers quietly, opening his jacket wider so she can avoid coming into direct contact with the trash underneath them. Being snuggled up against him isn’t so bad. It’s actually kind of nice, she thinks, laying her head on his shoulder.

“Great.”

Smirking, he nestles closer. “Yeah,  _ super _ .”

As the truck beeps and moves, she feels brave enough to start talking. “So, will you be okay after this?”

“What, with Clifford? Yeah. I’ll lay low for a week and then Cheryl will come looking for me. She always goes through these rehab stints.”

“Have you ever thought of not selling to her?”

“Did you see those bodyguards?” He raises his eyebrows. “If I don’t sell, she’ll just take it from me.”

Chewing her lip, Betty lays her head back on his arm, thankful the truck is mostly crates and decorations from setting up the festival. “I would offer to let you stay with me, but my dad…”

The garbage truck lurches, shaking enough to make her clutch his shirt to steady herself. In this light, his eyes are a mysterious, midnight blue. “I get it. I’m not exactly  _ family friendly _ .”

Something keeps gnawing at her and she can’t really process it - what with being used to contemplating everything for days and weeks on end. Would it make sense to run away with him? Just stay on the garbage truck route and see where it takes them?

Jughead runs his hand along her arm. “You still got your bag?”

“Yeah.”

“At least nobody filched it.” He sighs.

She frowns, shifting her bag to the side. “I thought all those people were rich. Why would anybody want to grab it?”

“Just because they have enough doesn’t mean they don’t want more.”

“Fair enough.” Betty rolls onto her back. “I mean, technically I’m alive, but I want more than my dad’s house. Maybe that’s selfish.”

“We all want to be free." Jughead sighs and shifts, accidentally dislodging her bag. "Do you think…” At his hesitation, Betty looks up at his face, carefully arranged in its neutrality as he picks at her sleeve. “Could I get a copy of your drawing?”

Although she’s not sure she can part with any more journal pages, she fingers the corner of the cover through the bag and asks, “Which one?”

“The one of me, I guess. It’s the first time I’ve seen my likeness outside of a  _ Wanted  _ ad.” For some reason, she giggles, his eyes flashing at the sound. “You think that’s funny?”

“It’s a  _ little  _ funny.”

“What doesn’t kill you makes you stranger, right?” He lays his head back on his hand, cushioning the beanie from the trash. “You would know. Both times we’ve met we ended up in a smelly pit.”

“At least we lived.”

The words are heavy and thick. She closes her eyes and listens to his heartbeat, wishing she can do this every day. Dying was inevitable. But this... _ this... _

Jughead rubs her shoulder and doesn’t say anything. After some deliberation, she hooks her foot around his ankle to stay fixed to his side when the truck turns. The jiggle connects their bodies in a ripple effect.

His pupils dilate, voice hoarse as he tightens his grip. “Hold on.”

Everything intensifies when she dares to look up into his eyes, the rattle of the city thriving up around them like some bizarre cicada symphony. The slow pulse of his pupils doesn’t seem like twitchy, dazed effects of Zydrate or Fizzle. It’s dark and welcoming, teeming with possibility.

The urge she has to submerge herself in a fantasy might be crazy, but Betty wants to know  _ romance _ … or something like it. Jughead’s not like the boys in the tent. He’s not symmetrical and synthetic. He’s  _ real _ . Trying not to breathe, she looks at his mouth, waiting for a signal - for  _ anything _ . His gaze drags down, his lips part, and that’s enough for her to lean in.

“Wait.” He pulls a fraction of an inch away, but it’s enough for the fear of rejection to radiate through her veins. “We’re in a garbage truck. This isn’t how you want your first kiss.”

“Maybe it is,” she insists, heat rushing to her cheeks. For once, she doesn’t mind her blood disease or uncontrollable feelings. “Right now, things are as peaceful as they’re ever going to be and I want to be happy.”

He looks away. “This might not make you happy.”

“I think it would. I want it, at least and I want to choose something just for me.”

“And you think you want me?” He chuckles, shaking his head, eyebrows furrowed.

Betty shifts up onto her elbow with a huff. “You think I’m that naïve? That this is a rebellious phase? I could’ve done something with one of the guys in the playpen!” Alarmed, he turns to her. “They didn’t interest me. And I don’t care if we’re in a garbage truck or on the beach. Nothing’s ever been ‘normal’ for me. I mean, it probably sounds pathetic to you, but I thought today was like a date.” With a pained sigh, she looks away, letting her palm rest on his chest while her own traitorous heart throbs amidst poison. “I know you’re not in love with me. But you… you were nice to me, you helped me, and I think you’re interesting. Attractive,” she admits, playing with his jacket. “After everything we’ve been through, I feel close to you. And if you feel this chemistry, too, I want to be closer to you.”

He looks up at the garbage truck’s ceiling. “You don’t owe me anything.”

Shifting back, she swallows against a lump in her throat. “Do you not  _ want  _ to kiss me?”

“No, I–trust me, I  _ want  _ to, but…” He frowns, his gaze dipping to her lips before dragging up to her eyes.

“What’s your gut instinct?” she tries. “Am I really just a mystery? Or is there something more here, Juggie?”

His eyes widen and his breath warms her face. Trying her best not to expect anything, Betty holds the intensity of his gaze. Heat blooms between her legs.

Jughead grabs her by the back of the neck and captures her lips with his. It’s not  _ sweet _ , not even tentative. It’s emphatic and persistent and somehow, even amidst their surroundings, it’s  _ sexy _ . She doesn’t really know what she’s doing, but she grabs onto his clothes and rides out the waves of attention, following his lead, the way his lips clutch and ease. Before she knows what she’s doing, they’re making out, her thigh draped over his leg and inching upward.

“Betty…” Eyes closed, Jughead eases them apart, his thumb gently caressing the edge of her jaw. “This is complicated."

“Kissing?”

He laughs, the puff of his breath a wonderful reminder of how close they are. “That’s relatively straightforward. Hooking up now, more than this, would complicate things.”

“Complicate things,” she repeats, tongue numbing. She sits up, scooting to the edge of the truck opening with a strangely hollow feeling. “I mean, we've already kissed. So… do you have somebody?”

“No.” It seems to take more significant effort for him to use momentum to join her in an upright position. Might be the replacement kidney. “You’re great, okay?”

She braces herself for a speech, her chest tightening.

_ Please don’t ruin this for me,  _ she wants to beg him, but that doesn’t seem fair. This is one of many days in his life. He doesn’t owe it to her to sacrifice anything to what’ll probably go down as the best day of hers.

The dark brick buildings pass by with their garish posters. It won’t be long until she’s back at her father’s house. The graveyard. Not worried about germs, she clutches the metal rim of the truck and watches the asphalt distort light beneath them, her feet dangling in black contrast.

What would it be like to jump off and keep running? Where would the roads lead?

Jughead puts his hand over hers. “I’m not saying I don’t  _ want _ …”

As the pause drags on, she fixes him with a dead stare.

“ _ This _ ,” he finishes, shrugging one shoulder, like he’s not any more sure what it is than she is. “But I have enough people trying to rob me or kill me without an overbearing Dad coming at me with a scalpel.”

“So why did you take me out in the first place?”

Sighing, Jughead looks out at the street retreating from view. “Feelings. Curiosity. Gut instinct.”

“What kind of feelings?” Betty’s voice hitches up in hope but she tries to smother it to clarify, “Do you like me?”

“Um, yeah.” It sounds more like a compromise than an admission.  Uncertain, she starts to remove her hand, surprised when he tightens his grip on it and takes a deep breath. “You weren’t selling anything. Just a pretty girl in a crazy place minding her own business and drawing a lightning bug, of all things.”

The glow of the lightning bug fizzles in her memories amidst her confusion. “Selling?”

“You asked me for directions and didn’t offer anything in return and I… it was nice.”

Embarrassed, she squeezes her thighs together. “Was I supposed to give you something? Money, or my body, or…?”

“No.” He presses a kiss to her forehead, then her lips, a light flickering in his eyes thanks to the street lamps they pass by. “You don’t owe me anything. You don’t owe anybody.”

With a heavy urge she doesn’t understand, she cups his jaw and presses her mouth intimately into his. Her longings and infection are too much for anyone else to bear. But they can share this.

They can share  _ today _ .

He kisses her back and it's _good_. It's sweet and real and everything she wants it to be.

Smiling against budding tears, Betty shakes her head. “I wish this didn’t have to end.”

“There’s always tomorrow,” he says wryly, running his hand firmly down her arm, “Assuming we don’t get repossessed.”

She giggles, a curious smile spreading on her face. “What?”

With a low chuckle, he shakes his head and leans in for another kiss. “It’s morbid.”

She looks up at him under what she always thought were decently long lashes until she went to the festival, trying to lure out whatever he's hiding. But Jughead doesn’t seem to notice, more content to cup her jaw and kiss her until her lips are swollen and numb. She can wait a few minutes to figure out his secrets.

Closing her eyes, she rests her forehead against his. “I refuse to let this blood disease own me, let alone  _ repossess me _ . When I go down, it’ll be for something exciting.”

“Oh really?” His fingers trail down her jaw. “Like what?”

“Grave Robbing.” She looks into his eyes expecting to see shock or pleasure, not… black pupils swelling like black, screaming mouths.

A metal ring presses against her throat, and he might as well be squeezing her heart when he slams his mouth, hot and needy, against hers. There are  _ teeth _ . He’s not afraid to nibble, to suck, to move down her neck and overwhelm her with need.

Her pulse is  _ racing _ . She could black out any second and she doesn’t care at all.  _ This  _ is the way to get swallowed by darkness. His hands linger on her belly, shaking, like he’s fighting going higher despite her enthusiasm.

It feels  _ so good _ .

She pulls him on top of her by the lapels, groaning and arching her back at the heavy impact as he gathers her wrists and slams them above her head.

“You’re playing with fire.”

“Lightning,” she reminds him, his eyes flashing just before she leans up and snags another messy kiss.

They’re rough and wild, grinding, palming over clothes.

Greedy, she pushes at his layers, frustrated by the sheer number and weight. “Can I see your chest?”

He blinks, sitting up and swaying like he’s dazed. “What?”

“The guys at the tent were so…”

“Chiseled?” he snarks.

“Synthetic. Same with the guys on TV. I want to see…” Her nails tease under the edge of his shirt, sinking into his waistband. “Something real. I want to see  _ you _ , Juggie.”

His Adam’s apple bobs as his gaze darts away in uncertainty. “It won’t be pretty. I’ve had surgery. Nothing… cosmetic to make it better.”

She takes off a glove, heart thrumming fast and hard in her chest like it’s about to ignite, and shows him her palms. “I’m not afraid of scars.”

The way he inhales and meets her eyes, she feels like he  _ understands _ . He takes her fingers and presses them to his lips, then kisses her crescent-imprinted palms. She smiles, her insides warm and burning and wonderful, even if she is dying.

Carefully placing her hands back on his waistband, Jughead glances over his shoulder to make sure no one’s behind the truck before shedding his coat, revealing lean arms. There’s an irregular patch of skin on his arm and Betty resists the urge to touch it without permission.

Once the layers are gone, he’s even more impressive than he was as a stranger in the graveyard. Every muscle is fascinating–every irregularity–even the large  _ J  _ over his kidney.

“You’re beautiful,” she murmurs. He guides her hand to his body, though he trembles under her touch. “Does it hurt?”

“No,” he says, voice hoarse, dark hair falling in front of half his face, the rest still under that unique beanie. “Not anymore.”

“I want to…” There’s  _ so much  _ she wants to do. Overwhelmed, she fists the scruff on the back of his neck and kisses him in thanks.

_ Taste. Draw. Experience. _

Everything becomes a blur of being  _ with _ someone, being understood and listened to without saying anything at all. It’s enough to make her want to tear her skin open and invite him inside of her. But she doesn’t. Not yet. She’s still processing, dizzy, drunk on touch.

Eventually, he rolls to the side. She misses the firm heat of his body grinding up against hers, the push and pull of their breath, the fullness of his attention as he grabbed her ass.

“I’m really glad I came out today,” she tells him, not sure if she should be shy after swapping so much spit or if it’s weird that she feels  _ great _ about raising her damn heart rate.

“Me too.” He grins, shoving his head through the hole of his shirt and obscuring his scars.

“Oh, wait! Can I draw you for a minute?”

He freezes, eyeing her contemplatively. “What if your dad reads your journal?”

“He doesn’t. Trust me, if he did, there are worse things than shirtless guys in there.” At his intrigued expression, she flips it open to the not quite explicit but nude self portraits she does when she’s bored of drawing bugs.

“Holy  _ shit _ .” Without thinking, he reaches for the journal, then hesitates. “Can I…?”

For the first time ever, she rips out one of the pages and hands it to him, blood thundering in her ears with a cheer.

“Thanks. I won’t show it to anyone.” He smooths his thumb over the curve of her real and inked back, his gaze lingering on the close-up of her detailed attempt at an eye.

Words seem unnecessary as she readjusts to the other side of the truck to draw him. It’s quiet and comfortable and she finally feels like she’s found a  _ friend _ .

More than a friend? Calling him her _boyfriend_ seems kind of outdated. People get married for insurance benefits or they fool around. There's not much in between. And yet, and yet, and yet...

Jughead takes her cues with grace, tilting his jaw when she asks. They chat about their lives as she sketches as fast and as accurately as she can. The truck is slow, giving her enough time to sneak a few close-ups of the sun spots on his chest and cheeks.

“We’re getting close,” he warns, glancing out the back.

Teeth in her lower lip, Betty shakes her head. “One more second.” Scrawling  _ WANTED  _ on the bottom, she litters the page in hearts and wishes she had lipstick to kiss the page as a signature. It’s teenage and embarrassing but this is one of her last years to do it, so she’s going to take full advantage and crush on Jughead with whatever her heart has to offer.

For the second time that day, and in her life, she carefully tears a page from her journal and hands it over to him. He takes one look and bursts out laughing at the mock mugshots.

“Thank you for this, Betty. I mean it.”

“Thank you for today.”

They share a gooey, stupid smile. Today was the most fun she’s had since she was a kid–maybe  _ ever _ , even with the uncomfortable moments with the Blossom clan.

Out of the corner of her eye, the metal bars of the graveyard fence chop her life into order again. Medicine. Schedules. Nothing fun, nothing spontaneous unless she bursts into song and dances around her room.

“This is it,” she says, half-hoping he’ll stop her.

“Yep. There it is.” He seems to contemplate folding the piece of paper or leaving it whole before tucking it away.

The truck rumbles over the gravel road, and Betty sticks her hands between her thighs so she doesn't dig her nails in. “You’re not… going to harvest?”

“Nah." He fiddles with his beanie and avoids her look. "Security will be ramped up tonight.”

She nods and scoots forward, trying to remember why  _ she  _ has to go back to the Mausoleum.

_ Family. _

The mausoleum portraits flicker with white neon in her mind’s eye.

They’re not living.

_ Neither are we _ , she thinks, her father’s gray smocks and sweaters, her white babydoll dresses flashing through her mind’s eye.

But she  _ is  _ living . She  _ did _ , today. Maybe her dad needs a break. To rejuvenate. Today was a breath of fresh air for her.

When the truck stops at the corner, she pushes off the edge, wobbling to stabilize herself as soon as she hits the ground.

“Hey, Betts!” She turns, pushing her hair behind her ear. The street seems a bit brighter as Jughead kisses two fingers and bows his head in a tribute to her. “Until next time.”

Grinning like an idiot, she hurries up to the Mausoleum stairs.

_ Next time. _

When she gets inside, she forgets all about taking her medicine.


	5. Sick

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *singing* IT'S BEEN A WHILE...  
> *cough*  
> Anyway, thanks for your patience, lots going on in real life, but happy new year! Half of this chapter was written before I ever published chapter 1, but it needed serious revamping for more Bughead, so I hope you enjoy it! This chapter brought to you by... ALL THE LOVELY COMMENTS. Seriously, I want to send you all leather, lycra, or lace in any combination that makes you happy. Thank you for being so supportive and I can't wait to talk to you again soon! ^-^ I'll do my best to keep up with comments amidst the madness of my life, but please do know I appreciate every single one of them, and every time I get one, I usually jump back in the doc inspired for at least a few more minutes haha. You have much power! Let's cha-a-ase the mooorning!

Betty throws her sheets in with her clothes before jumping into the shower. She wonders how many minutes, how many  _ days  _ she’ll have to wait before she can see Jughead again. Warm water envelops her in racy fantasies of Jughead joining her under the stream. As her eyes flutter shut, she imagines it’s his hands lathering her up, slipping between her legs, riling her to release.

Afterwards, she stumbles, bow-legged, out of the shower, and wraps herself in a white towel. She pat-dries her thin sheathe of blonde hair and studies her reflection a little more closely. Although she’s dabbled in makeup, sneaking what was left of Polly’s and her mother’s stash, and has drawn her own face enough to know where things could be accentuated, she’s never had a  _ reason  _ to make herself up for anybody.

Technically, she still doesn’t, although her pulse races with the possibility of  _ next time _ with Jughead.

Maybe he’ll touch himself to the nude drawings she gave.

The edges of her vision get fuzzy like spiders crawling into the darkness, her heart pounding worse than her father’s heavy gait up the stairs ( _ no, he’s not here) _ , and she slides to the floor, blinking heavily and clinging to the door knob.

It’s too much.

_ It’s not enough... _

Groaning, Betty stirs awake. Her father must not be home yet or he’d have peeled her off the floor. Stretching the awkward angle of her neck forces her to crack, her shoulder jerking in a shocking reflection that reminds her of her father when he comes back to himself.

_ Bad blood _ .

Swallowing hard, Betty straightens her posture and traces the wall for emergency support on her way back to the bedroom.

At least she knows who she is. Who Hal, Alice, Polly… and Jughead are.

That whole day wasn’t a fantasy, was it? She’s not mad.

She’ll be fine. Good enough for “next time.”

As Betty gets dressed, she eyes the medical cart, wondering about side effects.

No one at the festival had given her anything after she passed out last time… or did they?

If they did, it’ll be too soon to take more.

Sure, she passed out, again, but that might’ve been from all the hot water changing her blood pressure.

Is that what her medicine does when it puts her to sleep?

Making a note in her journal and sketching the labels and shapes of her medicine, Betty goes downstairs to make dinner.

Blind Hermione as background music gives her enough energy to remember… to feel alive again.

The sharp voice of her father pierces through the music. “Elizabeth.”

All her muscles tense at the flash of a half-memory of her mother grabbing her wrist.

The knife slashes Betty’s finger. A thin, growing ribbon of red unravels from her hand.

_ Bad... _

“Why was your heart rate so high today?” Hal asks, his voice measured, almost lucid as he hunches to one side.

Betty lets the knife clatter to the bottom of the sink and hisses through a forced smile at the sting of hot water on her palms. “Blind Hermione’s concert was on today, so maybe that’s it. I was singing and dancing and… she’s going to stay on for another two years. Nobody expected it.” After patting her palms down with a clean rag, the bleeding has stopped enough that she doesn’t feel the need to show her father for his opinion before tying the rag around the wound and hoping for the best.

Betty plops the potatoes in a pot of not-quite-boiling water.

Hal frowns and fusses with drawers without really seeing what’s inside of them. The grey high neck of his sweater only dulls his pallor. “Did you take your medicine?”

“Yes.” She tugs her hair. It’s not a lie, technically. “How was work?”

“Kidneys, mostly,” he mumbles, rubbing his face before collapsing into a chair. “You know, these people don’t take care of their organs. They’re failing.”

“The people or the organs?”

He raps his knuckles twice on the table. “Society.”

With a deep sigh, Betty keeps stirring, squinting through the steam. What she’d give to be able to open the windows without her father complaining of polluted air.

Hermione’s lilting voice keeps her company.  _ “Cha-a-ase the morning, yield for nothing.” _

What does she mean, anyway? That there’s always tomorrow?

Betty wants something tangible.

Not a dream.

As she continues stirring, her father stares, nodding quietly to some unseen, unheard lecture, because she’s almost certain it’s not to the beat of Blind Hermione.

Everything bubbles, pops, and hisses until the smell of cooked meat and broth fills the kitchen.

Hal rouses, his eyes almost silver thanks to the drab palette of his high-necked sweater. “What are we eating?”

“Fish and potatoes with carrots.”

“Sounds like an excellent source of protein.”

“Yeah, it’ll be great for all that muscle building we plan on doing,” she remarks sarcastically, but her father just runs his index finger down the curve of a fork and knife as if he hasn’t heard, too drawn in by the shape of cutlery.

Their chairs scrape against the floor as she drops off their plates and slides into a chair. Betty straightens her spine and tilts her chin up, though she keeps her eyes downcast, only flicking up to read Hal’s occasional, twitching expression. “They showed some interesting food at the GeneCo festival today.” At his silence, Betty crosses and locks her ankles, dragging them under her chair. “There was something red. A sweet pepper? Sounded interesting. I was wondering if next time you go to the market, or if I could go, instead--”

“Don’t waste your breath.” Hal moves the food to one side of his mouth with a click of his tongue and teeth. “Red. ‘Sweet.’ More like bitter cherry, stumbling, selfish, leeches.” The sauce sprays on the table as he extends a piece of fish on a fork at her chest. “You know what’s going to happen to those sinners? They’ll drop dead. Overdose. Botched surgery, murder after altercation because of their… addictions. Left in a gutter until that brother decides he needs a new  _ face  _ and claims it.”

“Claim a face? Who would do that?” Betty balks. Although Jason had been wearing one, she thought it was synthetic. Had it actually belonged to a victim? Would he do that to his own sister? “Are you… talking about repossession?”

He pulls back, eyes and mouth flaring open as his face pales. “Who told you about that? Repossession?”

Betty digs into her palms around the metal of her knife and drags a piece of fish off her fork with her teeth, giving her an extra moment to think. “I… there was an advert… joking about it. I didn’t really get it.”

Grimacing, Hal shakes his head. “People have to face their consequences. We’ll all face them, in the end. Whether by family or fate… it’s… a number, in the end. Penelope said...”

Hal stares at the white streaks of food on his plate, sawing the potatoes with neat, surgical lines.

“Dad?”

Without warning, he smashes the vegetables to bits, white gunk flying off the plate.

“Dad!” Betty hops to her feet and rams her fork into the table.

Jerking back as if he’d been pinched, Hal blinks, then stares at the wobbling metallic wands while Betty contemplates swallowing her own tongue, the knife still gripped tightly in her left hand.

Her heart’s beating fast.

No signs of black dots, yet.

Hal meets her gaze with a tired smile and dabs his chin with a napkin. “Thank you for a delicious dinner, honey. Sorry about that.”

He calls her  _ honey  _ when he’s not entirely sure who she is. Defeated, Betty slumps into her chair and yanks her fork out of the table. “You’re welcome.”

After a few tense moments of silence where Betty prepares to take her plate to her room, Hal stretches his neck, his vertebrae snapping in sequence. Each clack makes her flinch with the memory of her stretch in the bathroom.

He relaxes his shoulders as Betty gets to her feet, entreating, “Betty. I’m sorry. My girls have such a pretty face.”

_ Face _ , she thinks dully, barely sparing him a glare at him as she leaves the room.  _ Singular. Like we all have the same one _ .

Remembering Jason’s stitches from earlier, she sits at her vanity to eat and traces the outline of her jaw for any seams. How strange would it be to just  _ peel  _ a face off and stretch it until it fit? That’d be different from a chrysalis, outgrowing some kind of shell.

She stabs a carrot with her knife, then runs her tongue along its underside, eyeing the old window and the faint glare of billboards and brick buildings beyond it.

Is it worth the risk?

The next day is torture. Hal doesn’t leave so much as stow away in the basement to work on his labs for the cure. If a floorboard so much as creaks, Hal opens the lab door, wild-eyed and ranting at her to study literature, obscure philosophy, medicine, and anatomy.

As much as she loves reading, there’s only so much she can do before the words blur into ink stains.

There’s no one outside.

Not that there should be.

Jughead, or any trespasser, would be shot on sight.

Still, Betty finds herself peeking out in between page turns.

She doodles a pattern on the edge of her notes, then onto her nails. That should wash off easily. Every black stroke makes her feel closer to Jughead.

After she’s done two nails, she switches to her toes. For once, she doesn’t feel like listening to Blind Hermione. She wants something  _ peppy _ . Not Cheryl Blossom’s mindless drivel about  _ trying new parts _ , something actually uplifting.

Channel surfing lands her on the Pussycats, who are playing some kind of disco love song.

_ ~Ooh it’s so good, it’s so good, it’s so good, it’s so gooood.~ _

Crawling up onto her knees, Betty twists her frayed blonde hair into a clip and bounces like some of the girls in the music video. Behind the girls in leotards, the silhouette of a cat’s head glows like it’s fueled by Zydrate, buzzing alive..

_ ~Ooh I’m in love, I’m in love, I’m in love, I’m in looove.~ _

Using her pen as a faux-microphone, Betty struts across the mattress for a spongy bounce to each step.

_ ~I feel looooooove.~ _

She sings. She struts. She spins. Dramatic dips and stretches have her draping across the bed, touching her own skin, rucking up her dress until she shows her underwear to the imaginary audience on the other side of the window. 

If there was someone, she’s not sure she’d even be embarrassed. She kind of hopes it’d be Jughead.

_ ~Ooh fall and free, fall and free…~ _

Opening the window, Betty leans on the balconette. _ What else is out there? _

No one disturbs the dead tonight. No one except her. Lips pursed, she wonders about the effects of Zydrate on sexuality… on that pink-haired girl’s  _ fantasy _ .

Do people shoot up and feel some kind of intimacy?

_ ~You and me, you and me, you and me, you and meeee…~ _

It’s such a foreign concept that Betty’s gut swoops just imagining it, especially because the only guy she’d be interested in doing it with is probably exposed to sex all the time. Maybe she’s just excited about it because she’s sick and hasn’t socialized much. Hal always told her sex was dangerous. It wears out the body and risks infection.

But if she’s living dangerously anyway… if she’s going to die...

Betty closes the window and thuds her head against the pane. A synthesizer scales in the background and she huffs out an annoyed breath.

It’s one thing to risk herself, but another to risk someone else’s health.

She’s not sure why her mother ever bothered. It’s hard to imagine her parents with pearly white smiles and good posture from the old family reels feeling passionate or romantic with one another. Of course, Hal’s eyes didn’t have the hard glass quality they do now, and Alice and Polly didn’t even look sick.

Neither did Betty.

Maybe moving to the city amplified their illnesses. But if that’s the case, why would her father choose to work here? He hates it.

Could they sell this house, built into a mortuary? Or would they lose everything?

Betty tries to research house listings and apartments, only to find them blocked on all her devices.

Even ads for someplace called the Pembrooke lead to error pages.

Annoyed, she shoves her research aside and heads downstairs to start cooking dinner.

There’s blood on Hal’s sleeve when he stalks from the lab, but he seems in decent spirits when he comes up to check on her. “How were your studies, Betty?”

“Good. Great. I ran into some errors, but--”

He flicks his finger at the radio, which has transitioned from Blind Hermione to Cherry Blossom. “Turn that off.”

Betty hesitates, fingers trembling. If she doesn’t do as he says, she’ll get human contact. He would slap her. Haul her upstairs. Squeezing her eyes shut, Betty tries to dissociate as she twists the volume knob all the way off. It’s on, still.

It’s there.

Even if she can’t hear it.

Silence engulfs their funeral parlor of a home.

Hal nods in reluctant approval. “I’m going to review old tapes. Let me know when dinner’s ready.”

It’s not an invitation to join him in the living room, where he watches home videos of his descendants, of their family. Sometimes, he drinks or weeps, but most of the time his eyes reflect and shudder with the images on screen. Betty’s confused by the jump cuts, or the orange and red hair on some of their black clothes in the past. Father insists it’s from a stuffed cat she used to have. But did they ever have a real one? Sometimes, she wonders.

Her gaze falls to the basement stairs and she wonders if anything good ever comes from that lair. What other reels are stowed away in those depths?

Hal blinks at her, eyes wet and weary. “Did you take your medicine?”

“I’ll do it after dinner. Absorbs better that way,” she says, dismissed by his nod.

Flicking a ragged splinter of the door frame with her blackened nail, Betty retreats to the kitchen and glares at the canned goods in the pantry.

Most of them don’t start to expire until they’re exposed to the outside.

A primal urge to tear all of them open with her teeth rises with every whir of the projector wheel.

In the middle of the night, she’s awoken by the dull, metallic thrum of her father’s communicator as he shuffles to the stairs. 

_ “Midge Klump. 23. Heart. Last seen...” _

Betty blinks. Last seen? Why wouldn’t they be calling to meet at the hospital or a private residence, if she’s really sick?

Betty sits up.

For once, she isn’t zonked out through the night.

Throwing off her sheets, Betty accidentally knocks into her medical tray. Hissing, she holds the pill containers still. But Hal’s communicator is barely audible anymore, nor are the thumps on the stairs. Heart pounding, Betty waits a solid five minutes before shoving some medicine in her bag just in case she needs it, pulling on boots, bobby-pinning the lock, and tip-toeing through the house.

She wiggles her fingers against the packed dirt and broken wallpaper walls with the thrill of a cicada crawling to the surface, screeching for a mate.

“Please, please,” she whispers, whipping her head around every few steps, nodding at her mother and Polly’s as she passes.

It’s cold outside, and she kind of wishes she pulled on a sweater, though part of her hopes Jughead will do all the warming up she needs.

Will he have come tonight? Or has he exhausted his supply?

Betty scours the graveyard for him, sneaking past the tombstones as spotlights sweep the grounds. With a grunt, she slides into the mass graves, whispering, “Jughead?” to no avail. Part of her wonders if any syringes or notes have been left behind. But no. Nothing but old, musty, carcasses.

_ What now? _ She wonders, and checks her wrist communicator for the time. Her dad will be another hour, at least.

Waiting around the husks seems like a waste of time.

But where else can she go?

Rummaging with her bag, Betty pulls out her journal. The people by the alley, the stairs, and all that, seemed to know Jughead. They might be able to pass a message. Or if she’s lucky, she might catch him.

Assuming the Blossoms haven’t.

By now, she’s got the spotlight patterns down, and sneaks out of the graveyard without any issue, following her memory and the guide in her journal to the alley with the faint tickle of spiderwebs on the back of her neck. Perhaps that’s just the brush of her blonde hair. She’s not used to having it down like this.

A few people lounging against the walls stir to watch her pass, their necks rolled back, eyes half-open.

“Have you… seen Jughead?”

“Never heard of him,” everyone she asks mutters.

No one looks particularly familiar, so it’s possible, she guesses. Edging down the alley, fingers gripped tightly around her bag, she hears the rustle of leather and heads towards it, stopping short when she sees a group of guys--none of whom are Jughead.

“What are you looking at?”

Her throat runs dry.

Maybe he knows them? Or they know him?

“I’m looking for Jughead?” she tries.

One with short hair and eyeliner pulls at the pockets of his tight pants. “You need a fix?”

“No, I’m his apprentice.”

The guy cackles, flashing modified teeth--fangs, really. “Jughead doesn’t have an apprentice.”

“So you do know him,” she takes a step forward, “Can you help me find him?”

“Sure, why don’t I draw a diagram?”

“That’d be great!”

The men in leather laugh, and her spirits dim.

Fangs waves them off with, “I’ll handle this,” as he saunters towards her with a swagger not entirely unlike Jughead’s. “Listen, we don’t know shit about Jughead. We know  _ of  _ him.”

“You’re wearing the same kind of leather, and you knew he didn’t really have an apprentice--which I am, by the way, it’s just recent.”

“Sure.” He snorts.

“No, really! I… hold on a second, see? This is his handwriting,” she insists, holding up the diagram. “And I have a sketch of his face, and--”

“This doesn’t prove you know him. For all I know, you could be paid off by the Blossoms.”

Sighing, Betty glances down the alley, praying for a godsend.

Fangs leans in. “How much, by the way?”

“What?”

“How much are they paying you for a tip?” He licks his lips, bouncing on his toes. “Not… you know, not  _ him _ , but a hint.”

Baffled, Betty shakes her head, distracted by the buzz and pop of a fly hitting the halogen of a streetlamp. “They’re not paying me anything.”

“Only for his capture?” Fangs sighs and shoves his hands in his pockets. “That sucks.”

“I’m… I’m not working with them,” she clarifies, holding the journal to her chest to swear by it. “I really am somewhat his apprentice and friend. I live by the cemetery, and we met when he--when we--ran into trouble together. I wanted to repay him.”

Casting a glance over her nightie, Fangs leans in. “With what? A kiss? Money? ‘Medicine?’”

“I… all I have are my pills,” she starts, opening her bag to put the sketchbook away.

At the sound of pills rolling, Fangs snatches the orange container from her bag.

“Hey!” She bats at him. “Give that back!”

Fangs twists open the cap and pops a few into his mouth, chomping it into a powdery, almost candy mix. “Ugh! What are these, blood thinners?”

“Probably!” She jabs him in the stomach with the edge of her book, resulting in a wounded  _ oof _ noise. “I have a blood disease! Now give them back.”

“Tell you what, I can probably do  _ something  _ with these. Knock out a client with nausea and fatigue. Let me have the bottle and I’ll take you to Jughead.”

“Wait, what?” Still brandishing her book as a weapon, Betty hesitates, glancing at the gruff men down the alley, who are watching, waiting.

There isn’t any time to waste.

“Fine,” she says. “But you better give me a weapon until we get to him. Then, you can have it.”

“Why would I do that?”

“So I can protect myself. And so the guys over there don’t find out that you’ve considered selling out one of their friends for extra cash and medication.”

A strangled sound escapes his throat as Betty arches a warning eyebrow at him.

He rubs the back of his head and looks over his shoulder. “Guys? I’ll be back. Gonna walk this one for a bit. Make sure the Repo Man doesn’t get her.”

“Yeah, good luck, dipshit!” A tall one with a neck tattoo calls.

With a triumphant grin, Betty walks by her new guide, putting her journal away in order to take his switchblade as soon as they’ve rounded the corner. The cool metal feels good in her hands, and she flicks it back and forth, testing it.

Her father has a similar, if heavier-duty set of knives in his lab.

“So you really know Jughead?” He asks, clearly dubious.

The dull point of the blade doesn’t even prick her finger. “Yes. I really know him.”

People shift in the alleys, most in groups, lingerie, leather, and latex. Tugging at her short nightdress, Betty hopes Jughead sees her as more than a kid and focuses on the fact that she’s showing a lot of leg.

“This kind of goes without saying, but you can’t tell anyone about this. Can’t even hint it.”

“Not without a paycheck, right?” she mocks, relenting when the guy goes ashen. “I’m not going to tell anybody. Trust me when I say I’d be in as much trouble as him, if anyone found out about this.”

“I sincerely doubt that,” he mutters, leading her to a dumpster. “Well, this is it.”

She stares at the trash bags and giant, metallic bin. Is he sleeping? Dead? Was this all some weird, unfunny prank, like those reality shows Jason Blossom promotes on occasion?

“Can I have my blade back?”

“I’ll give it to Jughead, then you’ll get it,” she snaps. “Now, show me where he is.”

“This is it!” Fangs’ communicator beeps, and he glances down, licking his lips. The name reads  _ Midge _ , though the text is too tiny to read.

What are the odds it would be the same Midge as her father’s patient?

“Listen, I gotta go, and I need that knife, so--” He rolls aside the dumpster and street refuse, kicking and pawing through to the ground to reveal a round metal door. He knocks in the same tune of Jughead’s whistle, the Blind Hermione song, then twists it open and gestures to the dark maw of the earth. “There. Now give me the knife, and get in.”

“Are you crazy? I’m not crawling into some death pit. Jughead?!” she calls, waving the knife at Fangs, convinced she should slash instead of stab this guy, if the time comes for that.

“Don’t say his name!” Fangs hisses. “Now, come on. I held up my end of the bargain.” When Betty heitates, he scowls and moves in to grab her wrist with a growled, “No one would’ve believed you, anyway!”

Instead of backing up, Betty swipes the blade against the top of forearm. “Take me to him!”

Fangs grabs the red smear on his arm. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

_ So much... _

With the humorless flicker of a smile, Betty rotates the knife in warning, a dark red stain glinting on the edges in the low streetlight. “I told you, I have bad blood.”

A hoarse voice calls to her from the dark maw of the ground. “Bug?”

Tension draining from her limbs, Betty lowers the knife. “Jughead?”

“Come on down, quick!”

Throwing the knife at Fangs’ feet, Betty rushes to the bunker and climbs down the ladder, a faint blue light glowing near the depths. Two study arms wrap around her, pulling her flush against his chest. “Jughead,” she whispers, spinning around to face him, the streetlights barely illuminating his harrowed, smiling face.

God, his hands feel so good on her waist, her hips--all of him. She wants it.

Fangs’ voice carries down the tunnel. “Your girlfriend’s a bitch!”

He slams the door shut, encasing them in darkness.

Her hairs stand on end, a chill setting in with dread until low-level storm lights turn on, and she can see his smile again.

“You’re so blonde,” he says, running a hand through her hair.

“You’re alive,” she laughs, then fists the collar of his jacket and slams into him for a deep, satisfying kiss.

The skitter of rodents and drip of water fade amidst her moans, amidst the shuffle of clothes.

“What are you doing here?” he asks between harried kisses, guiding them both to a cot and pulling her into his lap.

“I needed to see you again.”

His tongue slips past her lips as his cold hands slip under her night dress. He swallows her moans, bites her lip, and twists her nipples until she’s practically worn through her underwear grinding on his tented lap.

Ripping the dress over her head, she throws it to the corner, flushed and ravenous. “Tell me what to do.”

There’s something slack, almost somber and powerful in his expression as he runs a thumb along her jaw, then presses it to her lips. “Suck.”

Sparrow-sized wings beat in her chest as she slides her tongue under his finger, grazing his ring before enveloping him in heat. She sucks him slowly, waiting, learning, scratching a primal itch to rip all her skin off and crawl inside his.

He’s completely focused on her attentions, eyelashes lowered in appraisal, his cock hard between her legs.

“Good girl.”

Tears spring to her eyes and she whimpers, a wave of arousal drenching her between her legs.

He smiles, then cups her jaw. “You like that?”

She nods.

“You’re so good,” he purrs, stroking her neck, her hair, her breasts, and when tears of relief slip down her cheeks, he pinches her nipple to divert them.

She pulls back, cursing, before sucking his thumb again, her cunt throbbing.

“You need more, Betty?”

Moaning, she nods again, running her hands up and down his arm, massaging and memorizing in the low white-yellow glaze of the room.

He yanks his hand free only to wrap it around her throat, clashing against her in a kiss while he bruises her thighs with a firm grip. After a few shallow thrusts, he moves his hand to her clit, rubbing with a ferocity that has her trembling from the intensity.

She rolls her forehead onto his shoulder with unintelligible, gasping pleas, barely picking up on his rough, almost teasing narrative.

“You miss me, baby? You want me? Tell me.”

“Yes.” She pushes back his coat and sinks her teeth into his shoulder, earning a hard thrust and groan, his grip tightening

Maybe he’s just as touch-starved as she is.

His fingers slip into her heat, the cotton of her underwear nearly tearing from the stretch, and he pumps, flickers, and stretches inside of her until the tap crescendos in a wild release.

She cries his name, teeth still half-embedded in his skin. She kisses and licks and keens, hugging him as she winds down from the pulsing ecstasy. “You feel so good. I love that, Juggie. I love you. You’re so good to me.”

Panting hot breath against her neck, Jughead nudges his chin. “Get on your knees, Betty, unless you want me to… do everything.”

No, she can do  _ something _ . She can listen.

“Tell me.” Dizzy, bowlegged, she basically slides to the floor.

Jughead surges forward to catch her around the elbows. before she bangs her knees.  “You okay? Feeling faint?”

“Yes.” Ever since she met him, her adrenaline’s been all over the place. 

She eagerly pulls at his boots and jeans, practically salivating as he wrangles out of his clothing, his cock poking free. Part of her wants to draw it. But the other, hungrier part, wants to taste.

His body’s angled like a throne in this hidden kingdom, and she wants to sit on him again, be his queen, his courtesan, whatever she can. So assured, so patient, he strokes her cheek and prods her lips while pumping his precum down his length. “Just like with my thumb.”

Kissing his thumb, then his prick, Betty places her hands on his hips and looks up at him. “Did you think about me, Jughead? Did you… look at my pictures?”

He twists her hair, the delicious pull at her scalp forcing her eyelashes to flutter, her lips parting in reverence for the intensity of his stare.

“What do you think I’ve been doing down here, Betts?” He jerks her head slightly to the left, where she can see her pages tacked to the wall like pinups, even his.

Sliding her hands firmly up his thighs, Betty spreads her torso across his lap, kissing his knee before laying her cheek against him. “I want to be here. Outside. With you, Jughead.”

“Once it settles down, Betts, you'll see we've all got one foot in the grave. But we can try this, if you want it.”

"I want you."

"Good. _Good_. Now take it."

Betty holds Jughead, maintaining eye contact as she engulfs as much of him as she can, his hand steady, guiding, and sure on the back of her neck, as they chase the morning, the night, and whatever time they have left together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know what's coming next? And I don't just mean Jughead! badum-tss!  
> I'll give you a hint: it involves roses and an altercation  
> Also, who else remembers Fangs selling out the Serpents in S3? So I didn't feel tooooo bad for Betty slashing out in self-defense. She needed bunker time with her man. And yes, Jug could totally see up her dress when she was climbing down the ladder.  
> Have a wonderful day and thanks for the support!


End file.
